


Deep Dish Nine

by LadyYateXel



Series: Deep Dish Nine [1]
Category: Deep Dish Nine - Fandom, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-06
Updated: 2013-10-18
Packaged: 2017-12-07 17:34:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 44,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/751178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyYateXel/pseuds/LadyYateXel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some sort of more legitimate title to come.  Alternate universe in which DS9 is a pizza shop and the entire cast is Human.</p><p>This particular story is an exploration and development of ~something~ between the medical student working part-time at a pizza shop, and the more-than-slightly-odd tailor who works a few doors down from said shop.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Maintenance

**Author's Note:**

> Deep Dish Nine is a Deep Space Nine AU in which the cast are all Human, and work and live around a pizza shop rather than a space station. The shop is connected to Quark's Bar next door, and there's a tailor shop run by a really odd man a few doors down. Everyone who works in or near the shop, coincidentally, lives in the apartment building in same block/plaza/whatever.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Deep Dish Nine! Miles O'Brien tries to fix the terrible electrical situation in the apartments adjoining the shop, and Julian joins him in the spirit of friendship. Also in the spirit of friendship, Miles offers his opinions on Julian's decision-making.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This particular chunk is in a different tense than the others, because I thought it was going to be a oneshot and didn't mind the 'next' one being different. What a fool I was! I plan to go back and change it, but for now, this first chunk is odd man out.

 “You  _know_  he’s just trying to get in your pants, right? Med students are smart enough to figure that out, yeah?” Through the wires, circuits and drywall, Miles’ voice was a little muffled. Julian could only see his legs sticking out of the access shaft.

“He is  _not_!” Julian protested. “That would be a phenomenal amount of time and effort – not to mention money on pizza – spent just to gain the sexual favors of  _a student._  He could go to  _any_  campus to _night_  and get in someone’s pants in exchange for the price of a textbook or a meal that is not prepared in a microwave. He did not need to spend weeks and weeks coming to a pizza shop.”

“Well it looks like it was a smart investment on his part, with the way you’re going.” Miles had told Julian he was trying to correct some of the obscene electrical fire hazards the apartments had collected over the years and years of remodeling. Julian had opted to spend some rare free time keeping Miles company during his work, though he thought it wasn’t so much ‘working’ as just that Miles felt unsettled unless he was tinkering with something .

“Miles, you’re not being fair. It’s  _coffee_. We are having  _coffee._  Is it a crime to want something _other_ than pizza?”

“Try asking Mr. Sisko that.” He grunted and there was a brief shuffling sound before Miles’ hand popped out of the access shaft. “Hand me that screwdriver, would you?”

Julian fished through the toolbox sitting on the bench beside him. “I’m not asking  _Mr. Sisko_ , I’m asking  _you_! Red or yellow screwdriver?”

“Yellow. “ Julian dropped it into Miles’ hand and watched his hand zip back into the hole. “And I’m just saying it looks fishy. Ah, there we go. Okay, hang on, I’m coming out.” Miles shuffled out of the hole in the wall and along the floor until he was clear to stand up. He dusted his hands on his shirt, and turned to face Julian – and his toolbox. “Think about this,” he said, gesturing at Julian with his screwdriver before dropping it back in the box and then starting to empty the contents of his pockets. “Think about Nerys and that Dukat fellow. Greased-back well-dressed smug-lookin’ older bastard comes in on a regular basis just to entertain the company of one attractive young shop employee. Possibly doesn’t even like pizza. Sound about right?”

Julian frowned. “Except Dukat _is_  a creepy bastard, and Garak isn’t.”

“No, he is. You’re just making excuses.” Miles closed his toolbox, and turned back around to snap the cover for the access shaft back in place. “And the only difference between you and Nerys is that Nerys has the sense to  _hit_  her creepy Cardassia Heights Bastard. You sound like you’re going on a  _date_ with yours. Somehow you’re the naïve young girl in this story and _she’s_  the one trying to chop balls off.”

“I could do that!”

Miles looked over his his shoulder and smiled. “I’m sure it would be adorable. And completely ineffective.”

Julian tried not to outright  _pout_ , but it was becoming difficult. “It doesn’t matter, because I don’t need to hit him. Or chop any balls off. Garak isn’t a predator, he just likes talking to me.”

Miles shook his head and collected his tool box “Come on, we’re going behind the panel on the fifth floor next. Can the fair maiden handle some stairs?”

“Call me a girl again, and I’m going to push you down a flight of them.”

“That’s the spirit.”

Julian followed Miles as they climbed the stair case. “I’m supposed to push Garak down a flight of stairs now?”

“It’s not exactly subtle,” Miles replied, his voice echoing over the stairs, “but I wager it’d get your message across.”

“No, it would get  _your_  message across. I like talking to him. I didn’t agree to coffee because I have some sort of perverse love of being bored or creeped out.”

“Or ravished to death?” Had anyone but a smiling, joking Miles O’Brien said that, Julian would have hit them with the spatula Nerys had given him.

“Not interested in that either,” Julian said. And then, smirking, he added, “I’d actually like to live through it.”

Miles grimaced as he set his toolbox on the floor. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that. Help me move this panel, will ya?”

The panel wasn’t difficult to move so much as awkward. Once it was unscrewed, Julian worked his fingers under the left corner of the panel covering the crawlspace while Miles pulled at the right side. It came off in one big pop, sending both of them stumbling backwards a few steps. Julian peered over the edge of the panel and looked into the hole. “Awfully dusty in there.”

Miles shook his head. “And probably full of connections that have been rigged to barely function and overheat at a moment’s notice.” He nudged his tool box with his toe. “Man the box again?”

“Sure. Don’t get eaten alive by the mice. I’m not sure I’ve studied the cure for the plague yet.”

They were silent for a minute or two while Miles squeezed his way into the crawlspace and got comfortable. A few grunts and and echoing metallic ‘bongs’ echoed out of the hole in the wall and Julian called inside, “Are you okay?”

“Just hit my head. The light’s no good in here. Nothing to worry about, I’ve got it.”

Julian nodded, though Miles couldn’t see him. “Okay. Well. Take your time.”

Julian flinched at how ridiculous he sounded and there was a pause before Miles answered, “Er… yeah. I plan to.”

Another minute passed with Julian staring into the plastic handle of the yellow screwdriver before Miles spoke up again. “Are you angry that I said he was creepy?”

“No.”

“Yes, you are. You’re mad that I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“I am not.”

“Julian, you’re not even half the liar he is.”

“You’re not going to make anything better by piling on more insults!”

Miles laughed and the sound bounced through most of the building leaving Julian with the distinct feeling of even the walls mocking his judgment. “Don’t take it so hard, I’m just being honest. You want to have coffee with someone, you do it.”

“You could have said that at the start.”

“That wouldn’t have been any fun. When is this ill-fated date of yours?”

“It’s not a date. And I already told you: I’m going this evening after his shop closes.”

“Well, I should be home by then. You should call if you need something.”

Julian smiles. “What, like a someone to save the delicate maiden Julian from the Creepy Bastard Tailor of Ex-Cardassia Heights?”

“You never know.” Julian could almost hear the shrug – and the smile - in Miles’ voice. “Hand me the screwdriver, would you?”

“Red or yellow?”


	2. Linear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julian goes out for coffee with Garak. And then pounds on Miles' door in the middle of the night.

“It’s just not the kind of thing Miles would consider, really, so even if I’m not sure I agree, it’s nice to even talk about it.” Julian takes a long drink of his coffee, nearly emptying the cup. He smirks when he considers the conversation he had before coming here. An entire night, and not a single Creepy Bastard stare, comment, or ‘accidental’ grope! “You know, Miles wouldn’t stop saying that this was a date when I told him we were doing this.”

The coffee shop is small and filled with just enough customers to feel comfortably social, but not so many that it’s overcrowded. It also, to both Julian and Garak’s amusement, seems to have a nebula theme.

Garak doesn’t look at Julian, but smiles into his mug. “And of course you told him the truth.”

“Well, yes, I told him it was just coffee.” Julian tries to smile back, but he suddenly has a nervous feeling that he’s said or done something terribly dumb. Garak doesn’t look up.

“And I assume that since you haven’t made any excuses to leave that you enjoyed ‘just coffee.’”

“Yes, of course! Like I said, I can’t talk to Miles about the merits of subtitled foreign films verses spy movies.”

“Then my question to you is:,” Garak’s gaze flicks up from the edge of his mug to Julian, “If this  _had_  been a date, and I asked you for a second one, would you accept?”

Julian nearly chokes on the last of his coffee. Maybe Miles had been right and this really was all some sort of elaborate and expensive set up to get Julian’s clothes off. “Er, It… wasn’t a date, was it? Is it  _now_?”

“No.” There’s no laughing or malice or hurt or anything but a flat answer and Garak politely shaking his head.

This doesn’t ease Julian’s nerves. “I’m… not sure. I suppose if everything happened exactly the same, I would do it again. I mean, if you had asked just now and hadn’t attached the word ‘date’, I would, so, if we were already on one… I think so?”

A sly but almost imperceptible smile crosses Garak’s face. “Perhaps a film for a second date, then?”

Julian feels his heart rate escalate so quickly he’s worried an artery somewhere won’t be able to handle the strain. “You just- I thought we just said this wasn’t a date!”

“It isn’t.”

“You can’t ask me on a second date when we haven’t had a first one!”

Garak grasps his mug with both hands and draws it across the table against his chest. He leans across the table with an almost conspiratory grin on his face. “But do you really want to deal with all the awkward moments associated with a first date? It’s all about spilling drinks on the other person and worrying about how loudly you’re chewing or laughing. Why not just skip that one entirely?”

Julian tries to smile despite the fluttering nervous wreck his insides have become. “First date after the second date, then?”

“Or after a fifth!” Garak says cheerfully. He leans back in his chair and drums his fingers once on his mug. “We could be creative. There’s no need to limit ourselves to a linear timeline.”

“Would we even  _have_  to go back and do the awkward one eventually?”

“Only if you wanted to.”

“I’ve just agreed to this, haven’t I?”

“I want to say ‘yes’, but I’m not about to put words in your mouth. It is, of course, your decision.”

“Well, I…” He weighs all of two or three sets of pros and cons against each other before he simply answers, “Okay. I suppose I’m up for a movie.

He doesn’t know what made him answer rather than asking for a night to think it over, but Julian desperately wishes he had more coffee so he could take a distracting sip of it.

“Fantastic, when are you free?” It’s subtle, but Julian thinks he can see Garak almost beaming and attempting to restrain it.

“Erm, let me see.” Grateful for the chance to do something with his hands, Julian hauls his bag into his lap from the floor and leafs though the papers inside for his work schedule. He glances at Garak over the top of the bag and finds that it’s much easier to look at him with some sort of barrier between them. That he’s actually looking through his things in order to make room for a  _date_ with _Garak_  on his calendar makes his chest tighten.

He also feels the need to warn Garak that this isn’t going to be as un-awkward as he thinks. “You have to know I don’t normally do this, right? I mean, I don’t li- I haven’t been interested in a man before. So I’m not really sure this is even going to work.”

Undeterred, Garak responds brightly, “How fortunate that I came along at the right time, then!”

Julian tries to laugh, but it comes out as just a puff of air. “I don’t think it’s your timing, it’s just… you.”

“Even better.” Garak looks smugly satisfied which is both embarrassing and sort of flattering.

“It looks like I’ll have Tuesday evening,” Julian offers, cross-referencing his schedules. “I’m sorry it’s not a weekend, but with work and lectures and labs all happening at different times it’s… not easy to have one of those.”

Garak smiles, in fact almost grins, though again it looks as though he’s holding most of it back. “Don’t apologize. Tuesday is lovely. Now,” he waves his hand at a passing waitress who refills their cups, “I think we were talking about cultural footnotes being included with films in addition to subtitles?”

 

****

 

“Miles, Miles,  _Miles,_ _ **Miles,**_ _ **Miles**_!”

The chain on the lock clicks against the door and Miles opens it wearing bright blue flannel pajamas and holding a screwdriver. “Julian. It is four in the goddamn morning,” he mumbles. “This had better be important.”

Julian practically falls forward and digs his fingernails into Miles’ shoulders. “I just agreed to a second date with Garak!”

“You told me it wasn’t a date!” Miles yells back, suddenly completely awake.

“It wasn’t! He just thought going on dates in order was  _too linear!_  ‘ _First dates are awkward_ ,’ he said! ‘ _Let’s just skip that one_ ,’ he said!”

Miles’s mouth hangs open and Julian is grateful that he too is fumbling for words. “ _Why_  did you-? I mean, what-”

“I don’t knooow.” Julian tightens his grip on Miles’ shoulders to keep himself standing. “I had fun and ‘ _Let’s skip the awkward episodes like we’re television_ ’ was charming! And then we just talked about movies for three more hours!”

Miles shakes his head in apparent disbelief. “… Did you just get home?”

Julian frowns and he is sure it looks absolutely pathetic. “Yes.”

“Don’t you have school? Why did he keep you so long?” Miles’ tone hovers somewhere between friendly concern and paternal disapproval.

“I didn’t even notice the time. And when I did, we came back here and he walked me to my door and —”

“He knows where you  _live?!”_

 _“_ -thanked me for the privilege of my company.”

Miles reaches out, takes Julian by the shoulders and shakes him, effectively rattling them both. “He  _knows where you live_!”

“It’s on my  _mailbox_!” Julian shouts, shoving Miles off of him. “In the same place as his, as yours, as  _everyone’s_! That  _isn’t_  creepy!”

“Are you tryin’ to convince me, or yourself?”

Julian blinks. “I don’t –   _you_ , dammit!”

“Do you want help getting out of this?”

“No?”

Miles closes his eyes, and sighs. “You and I are going to Quark’s.”

“What,  _now_?”

Miles reaches behind him and tugs his coat off the rack, apparently fully intending to wear it into a bar over his sleepwear. He pockets the screwdriver. “And we’re staying for as a long as it takes for us  _both_  to understand what the hell goes on in that head of yours.”


	3. Influence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Deep Dish Nine!Julian tries to work under the influence. Of many things.

Quark’s is not only open, but its proprietor welcoming and cheery when Miles and Julian walk in at nearly half past four in the morning. “Alright boys, at this hour, either something’s wrong or we’re celebrating. What’s the occasion?”

“Julian’s got a date,” Miles says gravely.

“A celebration, then!” Quark hurries to the display behind his bar and begins scooping some of the most ornate bottles into his arms.

“No,” Miles and Julian reply.

Quark turns slowly around, his arms full of a rainbow of drinks no doubt obtained with the help of someone from Cardassia Heights. He licks his lips like he’s smelled profitable blood in the water. “ _Gentlemen_ ,” Quark says with a fake sympathetic laugh and matching smile, “have we lost  _a bet_?”

Julian slumps miserably into a chair at the bar. “Don’t get excited, Quark; there was no money involved.”

“The money Garak is going to spend attempting to get your clothes off not withstanding,” Miles says, sliding into the chair next to Julian. He nods toward Quark. “Give me the usual, we’re going to be here a while.”

Julian watches the glasses fill in front of them, but his mind is not on drinks, nor on Miles calling Garak a predator again. His mind is possibly not even in the bar. He is positive he had wanted to have coffee, and he was just as positive he’d agreed to a date – whatever number it was – while of reasonably sound mind. However, he is also sure he still wouldn’t mind if he’d been accepting a date with Jadzia or Ezri. They were both still gorgeous to the point of distracting, whereas Garak was maybe just distracting.

Julian jumps when Quark taps on his glass with a pen.

“Did he say your date is with  _Garak_?” Quark asks, tucking the pen behind his ear.

“You know him? Has he been in here?” Julian is aware that this is a dumb question the moment he says it, but considering the day he’s had and the early hour, he expects to be forgiven.

Quark shakes his head and ‘ _tsk_ ’s. “ _Doctor_ , everyone’s been in here.”

“Stop calling me that. I’ve told you I’m in school.”

“I’m still going to call for you if someone chokes in here.” He pokes Julian’s shoulder. “Calling you ‘doctor’ lends you some credibility. Customers like that. Makes you look reputable without the effort.”

Miles separates himself from his scotch long enough to narrow his eyes suspiciously at Quark. “Don’t you need to have someone who can assist with something that like that  _on staff_?”

Quark shrugs and begins re-populating the display behind his bar with the bottles he’d hoped to sell in the spirit of celebration. “You wouldn’t believe how expensive those certifications are. And to do it for everyone who works here?” He scoffs dramatically. “When you folks moved in and brought him with you,” Quark nods toward Julian, “I decided it was an expense better left unspent.”

Julian braces himself on the bar. He feels like falling over and he’s not sure if it’s from incredulous outrage or exhaustion. “You mean people are risking choking to death here when I’m not working?”

Quark grins. “Let’s keep that between us, shall we? What’s choking between friends?”

 

****

 

He might’ve been just as effective in his classes that morning as if he’d skipped them entirely, because he certainly doesn’t remember anything that was said, or even if he bothered putting on new clothes to attend. If he really thinks about it, Julian isn’t even sure of what was said at  _Quark_ ’s beyond some distressing management details, let alone class.

“Hey, ‘ _Doctor’_ , let’s go!” Nerys snaps her fingers in Julian’s face and he briefly wonders when and how he got to work.

“Sorry, I was… thinking.”

“About cleaning up table five, I hope.” She physically opens Julian’s hand, shoves a rag into his palm, and then closes his fingers over it. Even though he watched it happen, Julian is sort of amazed that he’s ended up holding something. He considers vaguely that his notes from this morning’s class are probably completely useless.

Nerys crosses her arms and looks Julian up and down. “How much did you have?”

“None, really,” he answers. “By the time Miles and I were ready to turn in, I was supposed to be getting up again.”

“I meant drinks, smart boy, not sleep. Quark says you and Miles paid him a visit last night.”

In the back of Julian’s brain, one solitary thought manages to fully awaken.  _Quark knows about The Date._ “We…did. I can’t really remember if I had much to drink.”

Nerys grabs Julian’s shoulders and aims him toward table five. “That’s usually the first indication that you have.”

Julian takes a groggy step forward before he turns back to Nerys. “Did Quark say anything else?”

“Nothing more important than you getting to that table.”

 _This means the entire restaurant knows_ , Julian thinks.  _Quark probably told everyone who was on the early shift. He probably told Nog and Rom to tell everyone else. That_ Morn _guy probably knows._

The restaurant door opens with its usual jingle and Julian has never found it so obtrusively loud before. As he’s leaned over table five, sweeping away crumbs and water spots, Julian hears Dukat’s voice, though the words he’s saying make no sense whatsoever. Instead of whatever Dukat is on about, Julian hears flashes of Miles calling him a naïve girl in comparison to Nerys. If everyone knows about him agreeing to a date with Garak, Julian reasons that he may need to do some damage control.

Julian is striding back toward the counter before he really knows what he’s going to say.

“… been trying to convince her otherwise,” Dukat says, once again leaning too far over the counter, “but she is  _adamant._   _Naturally_ , I thought of you.”

Before Nerys can reply, Julian leans on the counter next to Dukat. “I’m going to have to ask you to stop,” he says.

Dukat and Nerys stare at Julian, glance at each other, and then both look back to him. “Julian,” Nerys says, “whatever you are going to say, don’t.”

Julian stands as tall as he feels able, which is admittedly not much. “No, you shouldn’t be made to handle this creep alone on a daily basis, and I won’t tolerate it. Until he knows that no one here appreciates this, he’ll keep coming back. I am prepared to show Mr. Dukat the door myself.”

“Oh, how  _sweet_ ,” Dukat croons, gazing lovingly at Nerys. “I didn’t know you all cared.”

Nerys aims the receipt spike at Dukat’s eye. “You stop, or this gets ‘ _accidentally_ ’ lodged in your brain. And  _you_ ,” she points at Julian, “just get out of my face and go on break before you embarrass yourself … some more.”

As Julian retreats to the back, he hears Dukat laugh. The next words from Nerys are, “Anyway, there’s still an art school in Bajor she could take a look at. Not a lot of staff right now, but…”

He considers attempting to render himself unconscious when he realizes he was trying to save Nerys from Dukat asking about schools for his daughter in Nerys’ old neighborhood. When Julian imagines the scene from Dukat’s perspective, a kid in a dorky polo shirt with stick-thin arms just claimed he would escort him from the building. Julian sits at the table in the break room and puts his head in his hands and tries to puzzle out if it’s just the lack of sleep getting to him today.

“Perhaps it’s time for more coffee,” he says.

“Cream and sugar?”

“I think black might be best at the moment, thanks.” He startles when he realizes there’s someone in the break room with him, and looks up. His heart nearly hits the floor.

“Jadzia! Sorry, I didn’t know you were in here.”

“Thought so,” she says. She slides him a coffee mug with ‘World’s Best Secretary’ written on it. “What’s got you so distracted?”

If anyone needs to be set straight about this date business, it’s Jadzia. Though it would better if she didn’t know altogether. “Nothing, I just didn’t get much sleep last night.”

She grins and enthusiastically claps Julian on the back. “I heard! Quark said you and Miles were there at  _four in the morning_! Did you win anything?”

“Oh, no, no, we weren’t there to play, we just needed to talk.” He takes a sip of his coffee, hoping to appear calm.

Jadzia is suddenly skeptical. “At four in the morning.”

“Yes.”

“Julian, no one goes to a bar at four in the morning unless something is wrong, or they need to celebrate.”

“That’s  _exactly_  what Quark said,” Julian marvels.

“See? I know what I’m talking about. Quark told us all that it was-”

Julian panics and little and interrupts her. “Look, whatever he told you, I just want you to know that it doesn’t mean it’s exclusive or even that it will go anywhere! It’s more like an experiment!”

Jadzia raises an eyebrow and takes a sip of her own drink. “ _What’s_ not exclusive?”

Perhaps if it worked for Garak, it would work for Julian. “Just that this doesn’t mean I’m unavailable. If you’d ever like to go out somewhere, we can skip the awkward first date and go right on to the second one.”

There’s a pause. In real time, and for people who have slept in the last thirty-four hours, it is probably not long at all, but it is long enough for Julian to recognize everything that was catastrophically stupid about what he’s just done.

“I think you should get some sleep, Julian,” Jadzia says. She’s smiling, but it’s a pitying smile. “With some refinement, I’m sure that line will work on some girl. Someday.” She mercifully pats his shoulder rather than his head as she gets up and leaves the break room, but it doesn’t take much of the sting out of what is, all told, a rather patronizing gesture.

While he’s considering submerging his face in coffee, Julian groans to himself, “Why was _I_   the girl the line worked on?”

 

****

 

Thanks to his sleep deprivation and his anxiety over Quark spreading gossip, minutes of Julian’s shift turn to hours. He is positive that he falls asleep while standing up more than once and he hopes for some sort of sign about who knows what with every glance he sends toward Quark’s. He manages to drop as many drinks as he forgets to bring out, and after an hour of soothing the angry businessman Julian spilled prune juice on, Nerys puts him on cleaning and register duty for the remainder of his shift. It was hard, she reasoned, to screw up cleaning.

As though the day had not gone poorly enough, while he’s pretending to clean under the counter Julian suddenly hears Garak’s voice.

“You don’t say! You should stop by my shop – I’m not three doors from here – and we’ll see if we can’t find something that would suit your needs.” Apparently still in customer service mode even in someone else’s shop, Garak’s enthusiasm rings as awfully fake when compared to the tone he employed while talking to Julian about subtitles.

The potential customer, however, is completely fooled. “Thank you! I’d love to stop by later this afternoon.”

“Please do! I should be reopening in about an hour, and then I can show you what’s available.”

“That’s wonderful, thank you! I’ll see you then!”

There’s a pause and the sound of the door jingling and Julian thinks perhaps Garak has left until he hears the loud ‘ _ping_ ’ of the service bell at the register above him. His options appear to be jumping up and startling the customer – who is very likely Garak – or continuing to hide under the counter and feigning temporary deaf and dumb when whoever answers the bell sees him huddled under the counter among a stack of empty pizza boxes and child booster seats. Startling Garak is less likely to get him fired, but just as he’s made the decision to get up, Nerys appears from around the corner to answer the bell. She stops just short of the register and folds her arms over her chest when she sees Julian.

“Are the customers interrupting nap time,  _Doctor_?”

“Sorry, I - Are you  _all_  going to call me that now? Did Quark put you up to this?”

“Why don’t we worry less about Quark and more about your own employment?”

Julian shuffles sheepishly to his feet and sees a very amused-looking Garak standing in front of the register with elbows on the the counter and hands folded. Julian tries to look as pitiful as possible when he brushes the dust from his work shirt. “Sorry, Nerys. It won’t happen again.” He looks at Garak and smiles weakly when Nerys huffs and returns to the back. “What would you like?”

“Nothing. I came to see you, actually. Quark mentioned that you were visiting him quite late last night and that you were not doing well today. I couldn’t help but feel responsible.”

Sighing, Julian braces himself against the register. “Is there no one he hasn’t told about this?”

Garak smiles sympathetically. He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a can of extra-strength energy drink and slides it across the counter. “I came to apologize. I didn’t mean to keep you so late. Or drive you to  _drink_.”

“It’s not your fault.” Julian takes the can and stares at the ingredient list as though he can actually process what’s written there. “I should have been paying attention to the time, and I was the one who let Miles take me to Quark’s.”

Garak’s hands are folded on the counter again. “I do hope it wasn’t because of something I said.”

“Not exactly.”   _One-hundred and fifty milligrams of caffeine if I only drink half the can._

Garak looks a little hesitant, and perhaps a little pained. “If you’ve reconsidered, you need only say-”

“No,” Julian says firmly. He grips the can tightly. “I haven’t. And if I’m going to continue at this doctor business, I should probably get used to functioning on no sleep. Thank you for your concern, really, but if I continue having this conversation right here, Nerys is going to skewer me.”  _Three-hundred is an awful lot. And I’ve had all that coffee today… Are there restrictions on this stuff? Where did he get this?_

Garak smiles and takes his hands off the counter. “I’ll spare you one more obligation for the day then, and have lunch in my shop. I’ll see you Tuesday?”

Julian nods, but his verbal response is so delayed, he says it nearly to himself. “Right. Tuesday.”  _Maybe I can just sip it casually once every hour._

The door jingles again as it closes behind Garak and Nerys returns from the back with a slip of paper in her hand, probably for Julian to sign to order to formally acknowledge that he knows he can’t sleep at work. 

“What’s Tuesday?” she asks, waving the paper in his face.

A little dazed, Julian just blinks at her. “What?”  _I could mix it with coffee. No, wait…  
_

“I heard you tell him ‘Tuesday.’ What’s on Tuesday?”

“Our date,” Julian replies blearily.  _To Hell with it._

“Your  _WHAT?”_

Julian cracks open the can and downs the entire thing. He almost smiles at the way it burns going down, and thinks pleasantly over Nerys’ flood of outraged screaming that it’s rather a relief that everyone knows now. That, and he’ll have to thank Quark later for keeping such late hours.


	4. Spy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julian goes to see a Romulan film with Garak.

Despite Julian’s attempts to hold it at bay in order to have more time to think, Tuesday arrives and is filled with advice he did not ask for.

“You should probably carry some mace,” Nerys advises. “We could put it on some pizza for him this afternoon if you’d rather just avoid this whole thing. In fact, let’s just do that, we’ll use mine.” She starts to reach for her bag under the counter when Julian stops her.

“I’m pretty sure Odo would call that unprovoked assault,” he says. “And I don’t need mace, it’s fine.”

“Well, if you change your mind, you know where to find me.” Nerys walks away shaking her head and muttering about consulting with Odo.

A few hours later, while fixing a broken oven, Miles starts off no better. “Did you know you can incapacitate an attacker with a ball point pen?”

Julian sighs, his hands full of the nuts and bolts Miles has been pulling out from under the oven. “Miles, I am not going to stab Garak with a pen.”

“I didn’t say anything about him, I was just commenting! Though, now that you’ve mentioned it, you should take one with you.”

“ _Miles_.”

“I’m teasing. You’ve just got to be careful of these older types.”

Julian grins. “What, like  _you_?”

“Hey, I don’t count. You’re not going on a  _date_  with me.”

“No, sadly. You’re married.”

Miles flails a bit and hits his head on the oven. “Whoa, what?!”

“Easy, it’s a joke. Garak hasn’t drained me of  _all_  common sense. You’d be a dreadful date.”

Miles rubs what’s sure to be a bump on his head later and shakes his spanner at Julian. “Let’s just make sure we keep it that way.”

“Noted.”

When his shift is over, Julian doesn’t make it two steps outside before Quark stops him.

“Doctor!”

“Quark, stop it.”

Quark grabs Julian’s bicep and pulls him down so they’re face to face. There’s a distinct sparkle in his eyes. “Did you know that bars can be lovely places for first dates?” His enthusiasm makes him look something like a balding schoolgirl. “I can assure you we are _very_  accommodating to lovers! Special suites in the back, if you know what I mean. You can even have some  _extra company,”_ he wiggles his eyebrows, “for an additional fee.”

“Thank you, Quark, but it’s a second date, and I’m going to a movie. Let go of my arm.” He picks up Quark’s hand with two fingers as though it’s a piece of slimy garbage. “In consideration of your generous offer, I’ve decided I need to go upstairs and vomit for a few hours.”

Quark claps Julian on the back. “But hey, vomiting! Now you have an excuse to back out!”

Julian just shakes his head, rounds the corner of the building, and climbs the stairs to his apartment. He passes the new guy’s door – there’s always opera blaring in there – and unlocks his own. As he flops onto his lumpy sofa, he reflects that literally no one he’s spoken to wants him to do anything with Garak outside of serve him pizza at work.  _It’s none of their damn business,_  Julian thinks.  _I can handle my own affairs and I know what I’m doing and I know Garak isn’t some sort of serial pizza shop molester._

After a moment of indignant frowning, another sadder thought crosses Julian’s mind.  _Is there no one here who likes him? Who else does Garak talk to?_

****

 

The lights in Garak’s shop are turned down low when Julian ventures out. While Deep Dish Nine and Quark’s blaze on into the evening, the clothing shop is just a dull glow. Julian doesn’t know whether to hope Garak has forgotten the date or not and imagines part of him would be disappointed either way. The light in the shop is a single overhead lamp at the back, and as far as Julian can see, no one is inside. He rattles the locked door and sees an abrupt shift in the shadows on the shop walls. Garak glides out of the back and Julian is amazed that he’d been invisible until then.

The door opens just enough for Julian to slide through and Garak beckons him in. “Please come in,” he says. “You’re a bit early, I’m still finishing up.”

Julian looks guiltily at his watch. “I’m sorry. I always forget that I have this set fast for class.”

“Nothing to worry about, I’m just sorry to make you wait. Make yourself comfortable.” Garak returns to the back of the shop where he’d apparently been sorting through a mountain of receipts.

Julian takes a good look at the shop and discovers it far more interesting than expected. This is the furthest he’s been in the shop (his only other time here being when he needed to lean in the door to ask Garak a question about a salad he’d ordered) and the size of the place strikes him. It’s not because it’s large – in fact, the space is rather modest – but that it’s absolutely  _full_  of various types of clothing, and that everything inside could be something Garak made or at least had some hand in. Though he’s reminded Julian many times that he’s ‘just a tailor,’ it’s hard for Julian to imagine Garak hunched over a sewing machine or measuring fabric. Being confronted with evidence to the contrary is fascinating.

“Did you make  _everything_  in here?” Julian asks, poking through one of the racks of formal coats.

“I’m afraid I was no help at all when it came to installing the flooring,” Garak says over the sounds of his cash register shutting down. “But the rest of it, yes.”

Julian boggles. “To fill the whole shop? You must be sewing constantly! How do you have time for dates and movies?”

Garak laughs as he scribbles a few notes on his counter top. “You assume I do this sort of thing often, though I’d ask the same question of a man trying to be a doctor.”

“Point taken.” An odd blue fabric on a mannequin catches Julian’s eye and he rubs the sleeve to see if it feels as soft as it looks. It does.  _And probably costs a small fortune_ , Julian thinks. He circles the mannequin to see the shirt from the front.  The color is definitely nice, but it hangs oddly. Julian tugs at the sleeve while trying to imagine Garak putting it together. He’s fairly certain this isn’t his style, but style has never been his strong point, nor anything he took terribly seriously.   
  
In the spirit of a date (and not standing about silently and awkwardly groping the merchandise), Julian adds, “Truthfully, this is the first  _date_  I’ve managed in nearly a year and a half.”

“Pardon me if I find that difficult to believe.”

Julian rolls his eyes not at Garak, but at the memory of his track record. He grips the sleeve tightly, unintentionally pulling it off the shoulder of the display. “You wouldn’t if you’d ever been a victim of some of my attempts at flirting.”

Suddenly, Garak is directly behind him.

“I beg to differ.” Garak leans forward and grasps the sleeve of the mannequin’s shirt, gently removing it from Julian’s hand. He’s nearly speaking into Julian’s ear when he adds, “This color would suit you.”

Julian laughs, though his sudden escalated heart rate makes it sound far more nervous than intended. “You mean bright red  _doesn’t_?”

Thankfully, Garak steps around Julian in order to tug the shirt back into shape. “My dear, that red suits _no one_. Though it doesn’t hurt Ms. Kira quite as much as the rest of you.”

“It probably helps that her hair matched the uniform for a while. I’d look like a sad clown if I tried that.”

Even though Garak has his back toward him in order to fix another ill-fitted mannequin, Julian can see him flinch all the way through his shoulders. “Please promise me you’ll never join a circus.”

“Oh, but that was my back-up plan if medicine didn’t work out!”

“Your parents must be  _so_  proud.”

Julian grins. Perhaps this really  _won’t_  be awkward. He watches Garak finish his adjustments to the other mannequin and then retreat again to the back where he vanishes for a moment behind a partition in the far corner. When he emerges again, he’s shrugging into a long coat.

“Ready to go?”

Julian shrugs and flaps his arms at his sides. “I… guess so. Didn’t come in with anything, so…”

Garak doesn’t seem to notice how odd Julian felt about that question, which Julian decides is really for the better. “Step outside for me,” Garak says, gently steering Julian toward the door.

Julian stands dumbly outside the shop window and watches Garak set an alarm, slip out the front door, and bolt it shut in one very well-rehearsed pattern. Once the door gives a final click, Garak pockets his keys, turns to Julian, and smiles as though Julian’s just arrived. “Sorry about the wait.”

“No, no, I really didn’t mind.” Julian tries not to think ‘ _this is the date bit, right now, here it goes, this is it’_ too aggressively. “So where are we going? Is it still a movie?”

“If that’s alright with you?”

Julian flails his hands a little. “Yes, of course, it’s fine!” Garak gestures to his right, which Julian takes to mean that they’re headed in that direction. He’s grateful for the walk as an excuse to keep his eyes on the path in front of him rather than having to juggle too much or too little eye contact. “What are we seeing?”

“I think I’ve found something we’ll both enjoy.”

Julian is skeptical immediately. “Oh, really?”

“It’s a film about a spy.”

“In which language I don’t speak?”

Garak gives Julian a smug smile. “Romulan.”

“I knew it.” Julian is hardly even pretending to be annoyed and it’s difficult not to smile. “There’s a always a catch with you.”

Garak frowns. “Well that’s not fair. I’d say it’s really more like ‘ _usually_.’”

“Of course. My mistake.”

As he entertains the company of someone who makes everyone he knows suspicious, Julian can almost hear Miles and Nerys telling him to bolt as fast as possible in the opposite direction. When Nerys found out about the date, her objections, warnings, and outright accusations were all about Garak’s assumed ties to shady people in Cardassia Heights. Miles hadn’t so much objected to the date as just strongly aired his ‘B _ut It’s Still Your Choice_ ’ brand of disapproval and tempered it with alcohol.

It isn’t that Julian didn’t hear what (or least some of what) they said, and not even that he doesn’t understand their reasoning. It’s just that where Miles and Nerys see a threat, Julian sees questions that he’s sure will have fascinating answers. He worries a little that finding those answers will transform a walk down a darkening street with a friend into a close brush with disaster, but for now, Julian is rather content to talk to Garak without a big show of red flags and alarm sirens.

Garak leads them around a corner, and the Miles and Nerys voices in Julian’s head warn him that he’s about to be disemboweled, his hollow body used to smuggle Ketracel-White, and then his remaining limbs packed into a sewer. Instead of maiming him, though, Garak makes sure Julian is comfortable with the plan thus far.

“I do hope you’re okay walking there; it’s not quite far enough to justify a ride.”

Julian huffs. “Have you been talking to Miles? He seems to think I’m a delicate flower too.”

Garak looks a bit surprised. “That’s not what I-”

Julian winces. “Sorry. It was supposed to be a joke.” Garak looks only half-convinced and Julian is fairly sure he isn’t going to earn the other half by explaining himself. “I don’t mind the walk, though. It’s kind of nice, actually. There are some days when the only thing I see is the inside of that building.”

Rather than laugh, Garak looks and sounds a bit bitter. “I sympathize.”

“You get to go out for movies and coffee, though,” Julian offers, still trying to regain some un-awkward footing. “Not exactly adventure, but it’s something.”

“It’s definitely something,” Garak says softly. It wasn’t the elaboration Julian was foolishly hoping for.

 _Should have found some way to ask ‘why’,_ Julian thinks.  _That was a chance to see what’s hiding under ‘tailor’ and I missed it._

“It’s only three more blocks,” Garak says suddenly. “We should be there in plenty of time.” He’s clearly avoiding talking about being stuck or abandoned or whatever has happened to him and Julian finds it a little eerie that he can actually  _tell_ that Garak is deflecting. He always thought it would be a great victory to see Garak so readable, but it instead feels uncomfortably exposed.

The light from the theater is visible from this distance and Julian is surprised it’s so close to home. “Wow, I didn’t even know there was a theater back here!”

Julian’s reaction almost instantly improves Garak’s mood. He smiles as though he’s sharing a particularly rich secret and Julian gets the feeling he really is. “It caters to a very specific crowd. You’re likely to miss it during the day if you don’t know what you’re looking for.”

The Nerys voice informs Julian that things fitting this description also include  _peep shows_ ,  _swingers’ clubs_ , and  _brothels_.

Two blocks later, any worries Julian may have had vanish. The theater is charmingly outfitted with an old-fashioned marquee, a tiny ticket booth, and some very sweeping and pointed architecture. The facade is lit as brightly as Quark’s, and is just as inviting. The shape of the building reminds Julian of his current home.

“Was this place part of Cardassia Heights once?”

Garak looks pleasantly surprised. “It was. I’m impressed; I didn’t know you had an eye for architecture.”

Julian shoves his hands in his pockets and leans back to take in more of the building. “I really wouldn’t say that, it’s just that these buildings are distinctive. Probably all the sharp bits.”

“Easily my favorite part.”

Julian laughs. “You  _would_ like the scary pieces.”

The smile Julian gets in response is definitely one belonging to a man who delights in the occasional bit of scary and Julian is not sure how to react. Is this some kind of fear-based flirting? Should Julian attempt to return it? Does he even want to? Thankfully, Garak seems satisfied with a bewildered expression and doesn’t wait for any other kind of response. Instead, he approaches the woman sitting at the window of the ticket booth. Julian is prepared to follow Garak’s lead here – asking for the same title and showing - until he realizes he can’t understand anything the teller and Garak say to each other. The exchange is brief, business-friendly, and (even though he can’t understand a word) Julian can tell it lacks the rehearsed and politely inoffensive niceties that Garak so often uses when talking to most of the other residents of their building.

Garak finishes with the ticket window just as Julian realizes that there are no words on this building he can read. Julian casts lost glances from the marquee, to the sign behind the woman in the ticket window, and then to Garak. “Am I even going to be able to understand the  _subtitles_?” he asks, slightly alarmed.

“I wouldn’t put you up to such a challenge quite yet.”

“Erm, how do I say the title of whatever we’re seeing, then? And how much does it cost?” He fumbles with pulling his wallet from his pocket a bit, but before he can do much with it, Garak reaches out, gently grasps Julian’s wrist and lowers his hand.

“First of all,” Garak presents Julian with a ticket, “what sort of person would I be if I asked you on a date  _and then_  asked you to pay your own way?”

 _Date. Right._ “Oh. Well, I didn’t want to inconvenience you or…” He trails off when he sees Garak’s disapproving frown. “Right, okay. You win.” Julian re-pockets his wallet and accepts the ticket with a small nod. “Thank you.”

“As for what we’re seeing…” Garak opens the theater door with a nod toward Julian, and Julian, a little embarrassed, ducks through. “The title translates to ‘ _An Illogical Conclusion_.’ It’s a bit of a response to a Vulcan film, though seeing both isn’t necessary.”

“I see.” Julian is a bit distracted by the décor and gives it far more attention than he does Garak or even the ticket he’s still dumbly grasping with both hands. While simply ‘rather nice’ on the outside, the building is beautiful on the inside. With all the lush patterns, the wall-mounted plants, and the sweeping arches all around him, Julian worries that he’s significantly under-dressed for this. Looking to Garak is no help at all; Garak is always very  _Dressed_ , regardless of time or place. Julian doesn’t always understand Garak’s clothing choices — Julian is more of a ‘throw it on if it’s clean’ sort — but it’s always very apparent that the choices are deliberate and careful.  
  
They also appear to be alone here, aside from the employees. Despite this, Julian still feels like someone disapproves of his casual attire. 

“Is there a problem?” Garak sounds more like he’s politely reminding Julian to return to reality rather than actually asking a question.

“Sorry, I was… taking in the view.” Julian pockets his ticket and tries to shake the feeling of being conspicuous in a pair of jeans. “You were talking about the movie?”

“You  _did_ ask about it.” He leans close to Julian’s left shoulder and points to a staircase off to the right. “We’re headed up there.”

“Oh. Is there balcony seating here?” Julian cranes his neck to try to see how far the stairs go.

“No, the auditoriums are just on the next floor. Come on.”

The stairs aren’t as high as they looked, but each step is just a little too deep and takes a step and a half to cover, making the ascent a little inelegant. Garak doesn’t seem to be bothered by the choppy walk and continues telling Julian about what they’re going to see.

“What I thought you’d enjoy about this – in addition to the spying – is the way the Romulan film makers portray the Vulcans.”

Julian frowns trying to recall Vulcan history. “Aren’t they related? I mean, weren’t Vulcan and Romulus the same place for a while? They’re all practically cousins.”

“Which arguably makes their little rift all the more likely.”

“Why do you say that?”

“It is so much easier to hate someone who is close to you and  _betrays your way of life_  than a stranger who is simply  _doing something different._ ” There is a fondness in Garak’s voice that doesn’t match what he’s saying and Julian wonders if this is experience talking.

“So… do the Romulans mock the Vulcans in this, then?”

Garak holds up a finger. “Actually, that’s the fascinating part. They work so hard at getting them right that in places it’s nearly a parody. Some argue it’s intentional, of course.”

“Huh. That…  _does_  sound interesting.”

“You sound surprised.”

“I guess I am,” Julian admits. “You and I don’t always have the same idea of entertaining media.”

“That’s what makes it fun.”

 _Fun._ Julian wonders if all they’ll be doing is having fun. He wonders if it’s polite to lie about whether or not you had fun on a date and whether it’s still a date if no one does anything even slightly romantic. He’s absolutely never had this problem with a woman, though he’s always been sure he was interested and was the one doing the paying and door holding and the stupid thing saying. He tries to let the theater distract him - long claw shapes stretching to the ceiling to keep him from wondering about teenage hand-holding nonsense and lush patterns in the carpet to distract him from the very real possibility that he may need to decide how to deal with a kiss later – but it’s not as helpful as he hoped.

If Garak is as uncertain about the boundaries and definitions in play here, he is not showing it. Instead, he cheerily leads Julian down a long corridor plastered with posters advertising currently featured films and upcoming attractions. There’s a ticket taker at the end of the corridor, but again, Julian can’t understand what Garak says to her, only that it’s quite light and friendly. Garak hands her his ticket and Julian scrambles through his pockets to find his and silently do the same. The ticket girl gives Julian a strained polite smile and gestures to the door to her left. Garak presumably thanks her, and he and Julian walk into a small auditorium.

“So maybe this is a silly question,” Julian says as the door closes behind them, “but why are these people showing a film in one language they don’t speak that is subtitled in another one?”

Garak had been ahead of him and focused on surveying the empty seats, but stops to turn and laugh. “They would have understood you perfectly well if you’d said anything to them! It’s just nice to talk to people who understand  _me_  when the opportunity presents itself.”

For not the first time in the evening, and what he suspects will not be the last, Julian feels rather foolish. “Oh, no, they probably thought I was some kind of idiot.”

“Or just painfully shy.”

“Embarrassed to be seen with  _you,_ maybe, _”_ Julian jokes.

Thankfully, Garak takes the joke the way it was offered and very nearly grins. “Well I’d say you have nothing to worry about. It appears we’ll be the only audience today and your shame will be minimal.” He motions to the empty room in front of them. “Where to?”

“Somewhere in the middle, don’t you think?”

“After you.”

They shuffle down a row of seats until Julian is satisfied that they’ve reached the center. Garak throws his coat over the back of his chair and as Julian takes his own seat he has the odd realization that he’s never sat  _next_  to Garak before. All their interaction until this point has been across some sort of barrier – a table, a counter top, once over the phone – so even though the point of being here is to watch the screen in front of him, Julian finds it hard not to angle himself toward Garak anyway.

“So you’ve seen this before?” Julian decides the best way to avoid awkward is just to keep talking, and Garak either feels like indulging him, or agrees.

“Yes, though it was several years ago. I imagine I’ll have a different perspective on it now.” It’s vague, but it definitely sounds like a cautiously exposed crack in the usual pleasant facade.

Julian knows from experience that asking  _‘Why?’_  will only earn him a smile and having the question turned around on him somehow. However, he saw one of these cracks exposed earlier this evening and he reasons that if this is the second one in an hour, it’s meant to be approached somehow. So, rather than ask specifically about Garak’s past, Julian turns the questioning onto the film.

“What is this about?” He laughs lightly when Garak tilts his head. “Other than ‘there are spies’, I mean.”

Garak’s expression reads almost as if he’s  _proud_  of Julian’s indirect approach. “It’s about a Romulan spy trying to blend in among Vulcan society and the effects the assignment has on him. It’s been regarded as anything from hilariously funny to pitifully sad, depending on who you talk to.”

“And how do  _you_  feel about it?”

“I think I’m about to find out.”

“Has it really been that long?” Julian hopes he doesn’t sound painfully young.

Garak only smiles and shrugs. “Circumstances change. Experience plays its part.”

Thinking of age and experience clears up some of the hazy recollections Julian has of being in Quark’s with Miles. Garak’s age – which Miles did not know and Quark would not divulge without payment – was apparently the tell-tale sign that he had less than good intentions.

Quark had leaned over the bar, elbowed Julian, and said, “ _No matter how old you get, you never stop liking them young and pretty, Doctor._ ” Julian remembered thinking that it sounded as much like a warning as it did like Quark calling him pretty and that both thoughts were rather disturbing.

The fact that this is a  _date,_  not to mention Garak’s incredibly careful flirting, means that there is most likely attraction present, but Julian is certain that ‘bed the dorky not-quite-medical student’ is not Garak’s primary motivation. After all, if Garak were only interested in sex, surely he’d go about it differently than paying for tickets to intellectually stimulating foreign films.

At least, Julian assumes it will be intellectual. This is something  _Garak_ has brought him to see, so it has to be at least  _complicated._    
  
Just then, the lights dim, the speakers crack, the screen sputters to life, and as the opening titles begin, Julian wishes he’d brought something to make notes. The titles are simple white words on a solid black field and are incredibly understated. Julian laughs a little when he considers how well they match what he’s seen most Romulans wearing.

A moment later, the first scene fades in. And in. And in and in until it’s so bright and overly saturated that it hurts Julian to look directly at the screen. Shielding his eyes, he turns to Garak, who is flinching a bit. Garak smiles apologetically and whispers, “It’s supposed to be like this. I’m sorry, I meant to warn you.”

“Don’t tell me this is the ‘almost parody’ part.”

“Well, it’s related.”

Julian tries to look back at the screen but can only manage with one eye. “You thought I’d  _like_  having my retinas burned out? Does it  _stay_  like this?”

“You’ll get used to it, I promise. It’s part of the effect of the story. Trust me for an hour or two.”

Though Julian doubts he’ll ever get used to them, within ten minutes he’s able to look at the colors as a painful part of the director’s vision,  and he’s focusing more on what’s happening to the spy. Said spy is called Sanik, and he’s sent to gather some information on the family of a suspected terrorist. He finds Vulcan society at once too restrained and too garish. How, he asks himself as he sighs over his grey Romulan garb, does color fit into logic? Who will he ever have to explain this to him while he’s in hiding? Sanik has several of the ridiculous gadget-y trappings that Julian finds in movies more to his own tastes, and Sanik definitely uses them in just as ridiculous ways, complete with eye-scarring color filters. Julian genuinely laughs at some of the things Sanik does while subtly mocking the inconsistencies in Romulan and Vulcan ideology, and occasionally, when he laughs a little too loudly, Julian can feel Garak watching him rather than the screen.

Unlike the protagonists of Julian’s usual entertainment, Sanik occasionally has moments of frustration and alienation when left alone. He also isn’t going home with every attractive person he meets. Instead, he panics when he befriends one Vulcan during an impromptu philosophy discussion, and has something of an identity crisis when he sympathizes with another and gives her the information she needs to get her brother out of Romulan territory. Julian marvels right along with Sanik at how the Vulcan woman presented her brother’s case both logically and emotionally but somehow without overtly revealing the latter.

It’s when Sanik kills another Romulan in defense of the family he’s supposed to be helping to destroy that he breaks down and exposes himself to the Vulcan authorities. He tries to plead his case to stay in Vulcan territory, and even attempts to argue that he was bound to be found out and that confessing was the logical thing to do, but the Vulcans disagree, calling him far too passionate. As he’s awaiting trial wearing a colored Vulcan tunic, Sanik’s superiors pay him a visit and criticize him, calling his decision not brave or valiant, but cold, weak, and really rather Vulcan. They decide to leave him at the mercy of the Vulcan people, rather than attempt to save him.

As the camera closes in on Sanik in his gray cell, Julian feels Garak elbow him and then lean close to whisper something. “Pay close attention to this,” he says.

Sanik’s final line is subtitled as, “ _I have become theirs_.”

Julian isn’t sure what he’s supposed to be paying attention to and when the screen fades to black, he turns to look at Garak. “Did he not really say that?”

“You remember our talk about cultural notes being included with subtitles? Sanik speaks a particular dialect, and with his accent, that line could also be translated as ‘I have become  _them.’”_

 _“_ Which one is it supposed to be?”

“No one knows. The director was…  _silenced_  in response to this film.”

Julian gapes. “Someone was  _murdered_  for making this?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“And you thought, ‘ _Oh, movie that killed people! It’s a date_!’?”

Garak smiles. “Did you like it?”

Julian blinks in surprise. “…Yes.”

“Then, yes, that’s exactly what I did.”

Julian stares at the rolling credits. He’s not completely sure what difference ‘them’ or ‘theirs’ makes. He isn’t even sure how to feel about the movie as a whole. He could see the whole thing as commentary on how utterly mad the Vulcans and Romulans are with their logical colors or passionate grays and then it’s quite funny, but the film was just as much the story of a stranded man coming to see himself in his enemy and losing himself in the process. Which, strangely, reminds Julian that Garak has seen this at least once before.

“How did you feel about it this time around?” Julian asks.

Garak raises his eyebrows and draws a deep breath. “It was funnier when I was younger.” He sighs a little and regards the screen. “Did  _you_ find it funny?”

“I don’t know,” Julian admits slowly, afraid to let his age sound like a factor in his answer. “I don’t know if I’ve even processed the significance of ‘ _them_ ’ versus ‘ _theirs_.’ They’re both defeat, aren’t they?”

“One,” Garak says, standing up and collecting his coat, “is a prison. The other is an identity.”

Julian has decided this is entirely too heavy for date material and just stares in baffled silence for several seconds before scrambling to collect himself and follow Garak’s lead out of the auditorium.

His brain is still trying to make sense of the evening as they descend the stairs. Did Garak select this movie for a reason? Who had the director murdered and for which reason? Why is an old Cardassia Heights theater playing this movie? Had he made mistakes in the past taking women to romantic comedies?

“I rather thought you’d have more to say about it,” Garak says suddenly. They’re standing in the lobby, and Garak is holding the door open.

“Just thinking it all through.” Julian bows through the door and Garak lets it close behind them. It’s much colder outside than it was when they arrived. “I think if I had some time to sort out my thoughts, I’d be more engaging conversation.”

“Well, if you happen to have the time to think aloud and with company, there’s a small cafe about a block and half that way.” Garak’s smile is a little mischievous as points over Julian’s shoulder. He clearly knows he’s stretching this date thing, and now he’s testing the lengths Julian will take it.

Julian checks his watch. It’s not  _too_  late. They’re also closer to home than they were in the coffee shop and if Garak is going to stretch, then Julian can too.

“Will you tell me if you prefer ‘theirs’ or ‘them’ if I go?”

“If you ask the right questions.”

“I could take a cue from Miles and let some alcohol drag it out of you.”

“I’m not entirely sure we’ve been on enough dates for that.”

Julian crosses his arms over his chest, pretending to think. “It would need to be what, eight or nine, you think?”

Garak’s smile appears painful for him so restrain. “I should think so.”

Julian grins back and drops his arms in mock-defeat. “Well, then. I’ll have to do what I can with trying for the right questions.” He turns and gestures down the block. If the left over voices of Miles and Nerys are present, he can’t hear them. “Lead on.”

He realizes as he’s walking away from the theater’s light that he can’t recall when he got used to the colors.


	5. Saturation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Discussion in a small cafe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It is maybe worth mentioning that some bits of Garak have been informed by interpretations of things from 'A Stitch In Time'.

In the block and half walk to the cafe, it starts to rain and Julian is happy he’ll be inside for a while.

The cafe itself is very much like the place they first had coffee, though Julian notes that this place, like the theater, appears empty but for the employees.

They settle in at a table by the window and just as Garak flips open the menu that had been tucked in with the sugar packets, Julian leans across the table. He keeps his voice low, just in case. “Does it seem odd to you that there are no people out at these places tonight? I mean, I know it’s  _Tuesday_ , but this is a little ridiculous.”

Garak doesn’t even glance up from the menu. “Perhaps it’s just us.”

Julian rolls his eyes. “Yes, this entire area knew we were coming and decided to clear out for us.”

“Alternately,  _they_  don’t want to be seen out with me either.”

There is no smile, no ironic tone, and no significant glace to accompany that sentence and it is distinctly uncomfortable. Julian is fairly sure it’s a joke referencing his own from earlier, but laughing seems terribly wrong here.

“Their loss, then,” he says.

Garak gives Julian a curious look from behind the menu, as though he’s not sure of what he just heard. For a lack of any better reaction, Julian just tries to smile, though he’s sure it comes out a little sheepish. Garak shakes his head and laughs so softly it might as well just be a quick breath. Julian gets the feeling Garak is laughing at himself.

Garak folds the little menu in half and offers it to Julian, though he doesn’t make eye contact, or even any real effort to look at him. “Here. Find something you like.”

Julian takes the menu, and unfolds it to look, but can hardly process the words on the page as he’s trying to figure out what he’s done to inspire Garak’s sudden disconnect. Did Julian hit a sore spot? Are people  _actually_  avoiding Garak in public?  _Does this sandwich say it’s deep fried?_ Did Julian accidentally flirt and just make Garak feel old or dumb or sad?  _Who deep fries a sandwich?_ Why would flirting even upset him? 

He struggles with looking like he’s genuinely interested in the menu while replaying the interaction in his head for a few seconds until he realizes how foolish it is to be doing this. Garak asked him on a  _date,_ and seems to like him enough to put up with babbling on lunch breaks, surely Julian can’t have ruined anything in the time it took to walk two blocks and sit down in a cafe.

“Did I… do something wrong?”

Garak takes a sharp breath and then waves his hand dismissively. “No, no. I’m sorry. I just remembered something, that’s all.” He nods toward the menu in Julian’s hands. “Do you already know what you want?”

Julian blinks and scans the menu rapidly for something cheap. “Oh, er, just some tea, I think.”

“You aren’t hungry?”

“It’s not that, I just can’t afford…” His eyes dart over the deep fried sandwich again. “You’re planning to pay for this as well, aren’t you?”

Garak frowns disapprovingly. “How many dates have you let pay for their own food?”

Julian bites his lip, caught. “None.”

“So get something.” Garak leans his elbows on the table, interlaces his fingers and rests his chin on his hands.

“In my defense, I’m not used to being on this end of it.”

“You can pay for mine next time.” Garak smirks and Julian can’t help but laugh.

“Only if you’d like to  _rent_  the movie and you’re okay eating peanut butter sandwiches in my apartment. I can probably afford that.”

It takes Garak raising his eyebrows in clear heightened interest for Julian to realize what he’s said. His mouth falls open as he tries to come up with some way to un-say it while Garak looks positively coy.

“Well, I can definitely say I didn’t expect  _you_  to be the one asking  _me_  on another one of these.”

Julian stumbles through his stalling vocabulary on his way to an actual explanation. “Oh, er, wait, I-”

Garak, however, is apparently feeling merciful. “And if you should ever  _really_  make that offer, I’d be happy to accept.”

“It wasn’t a non-offer, it just…”  _Felt natural to joke? Sounded too much like the kind of ‘Do you want to come in?’ that actually means ‘Do you want to sleep with me?’?_

 _“_ But maybe another time. I understand.”

Julian bites his lip. “I’m not sure you do.”  _I’m not even sure_ _I_ _do._

Garak flicks the back of the menu in Julian’s hand. “If you’re going to get something, you need to actually look at this.”

“Okay, okay. I’m looking.”

The menu is littered with things that sound both terrifying and intriguing, the least of which is the deep fried sandwich. There are types of meat that Julian doesn’t even recognize and combinations that make him a little queasy even considering. He wonders if Garak eats this sort of thing all the time and what he’ll have to look at from across the table later.

Finally, Julian finds a sandwich in the ‘Late Night Specials’ section that sounds both light and not made of ingredients he can’t pronounce. At nearly the same moment, a young waitress arrives at the table. She’s Cardassian, judging by her straight black hair and her skin tone, and Julian thinks she’s a little younger than he is but is thrown off by her extremely bright smile and the puffy white lace poking out from under her light blue dress.

She says brightly, “What can I get you?”

And then Garak answers her, but just like before, Julian doesn’t understand. He’s a little irritated, but it apparently makes the waitress’s day to talk to Garak. She beams and chatters quickly back at him. Julian sits on the sidelines of the conversation, very near to twiddling his thumbs.  Yet again, a random employee chats with Garak and Julian is left to play dumb in the background.

 _Maybe Tuesdays are the only days they let excommunicated Cardassians outside,_  Julian thinks.  _He’s wearing some kind of ankle bracelet that will explode on the stroke of Wednesday._ He laughs a little at his own joke and the waitress turns to him, surprised.

She asks him something, but, of course, he doesn’t understand her. He looks to Garak for a translation.

Garak smiles politely at girl and touches her wrist. “He doesn’t understand.”

“Are you sure?” She gives Julian a suspicious look and he tries to look as innocent as possible in response.

“I’m sure.” Garak is really rather reassuring, which makes Julian wonder what the waitress thought he was laughing at. Garak steers the conversation away from Julian’s language comprehension and to the real matter at hand with a nod in Julian’s direction: “Did you decide on something?”

“Oh, yes! Erm, yes, I’ll have number four and some hot tea.”

“Number four, okay! I’ll be right back with your drinks.” She makes a very emphatic  _underline, dot_ on her notepad, gives them both a courteous nod, and skips away to the back.

“She was charming,” Garak says.

“Do you know  _everyone_  around here? Are they  _all_ Cardassian?”

Garak tilts his head. “Pardon?”

“You’ve talked to everyone we encountered tonight – which is admittedly not a lot – but it’s been one-hundred percent of them.”

“I don’t know them, I’m just trying to be friendly. I already told you that being able to talk like that is quite rare for me. Why wouldn’t I take advantage of it?”

Julian sighs and suddenly Sanik the spy comes back to the forefront of his thoughts.  _Prison or identity? “_ Why not go somewhere where it isn’t so rare?”

“I can’t do that.” There’s a wistful quality to Garak’s voice for only a moment. In the next second he’s almost customer service again. “Besides, I have a shop to maintain.”

“Tailoring. Right.” Julian knows he won’t get an answer this way, but he cannot resist it. “But is tailoring the prison or the identity?”

A moment of surprise is replaced by smug delight. “ _Very_ good try. A little too forward, but you’re getting there.”

Julian laughs. “You act like I’m here for lessons.”

“What  _are_  you here for?”

“A date, apparently.”

Garak straightens the bundle of utensils on the table in front of him. “Why don’t you tell me, now that you’ve had time to think, which version of Sanik’s line  _you_  liked better?”

Julian takes a deep breath. This is the part in which he proves that he’s not a total waste of effort and movie tickets. “Well, I _liked_  Sanik, so the ending in general was sad, no matter which word he said, though I think I prefer  _‘them.’_ I like thinking that he didn’t just bow down and decide he was done for. He seemed a bit too strong to just give up.”

“What other options do you think he has?”

Julian shrugs. “Secret laser pen? A shoe that transforms into a gun?”

Garak gives him a tight – yet very fond - smile. “Don’t you think the Vulcans would have been smart enough to look for things like that?”

“That’s the beauty of it, though!” Julian exclaims, making a grand gesture with his hands. “Who suspects a  _shoe_?!”

“Vulcan victims of espionage, I would think.”

Julian frowns. “Have you ever even  _seen_  a spy movie with proper gadgets?”

“Yes, and I can’t say I was impressed; there’s no sense of real gravity or seriousness to it at all.”

“They’re not meant to be taken seriously!”

“Oh? Didn’t you take  _Sanik_  seriously?”

“Well, I-” Julian stops and tries to rethink. “I think he’s different.”

“I’m interested to hear how.”

The waitress returns with drinks and Julian is delighted to have tea to fuss with while he talks through this. She smiles sweetly at them and taps the side of their table. “The food will be out in a just a few minutes.”

Garak nods in thanks and she flutters away. He leans over the table again, puts his chin in one hand and waves Julian onward with the other. “You were saying?”

Julian pours some sugar into his tea and stirring it seems to help him consider Sanik against every other spy-hero he’s ever seen. “Well, I think  _his_  whole movie is meant to be taken seriously, so the fact that he has all these things that non-serious characters have… just sort of makes him sadder. It’s like he doesn’t even get to enjoy the sort of fun movie he’s supposed to be in. His weapons and the way parts of his story are told are almost mocking him.”

 “What if you found out the intended ending was  _‘theirs’?”_

Julian puts his spoon down with a little more force than intended.  _“_ Oh, _no._  It isn’t, is it?”

Garak shrugs and his eyes flutter shut. “I told you: no one knows.”

“Did someone really have the director killed?” Julian keeps his voice low, afraid to upset someone, even if just the staff. Though why he thinks this will bother anyone, he isn’t sure.

“You can imagine this was not a popular film with the Romulan community.” Garak takes a sip from his glass.

“Nor the Vulcans, though, surely? It seemed equal opportunity mocking to me, and the Vulcans didn’t off anybody over it. Why bother killing the poor guy when he’s said things just as bad about your ‘enemies’ as he did about you? And why just the director? What about the actor who played Sanik? Or the writers, or even the wardrobe people?”

“Both communities on the whole seem a bit uncomfortable with ambiguity. They’ve worked very hard to say they’re separate people for a long time, and Sanik is something neither Vulcan nor Romulan by the end. Perhaps no one could reconcile identifying strongly with half of him and reviling the other half.”

Julian’s shoulders slump a little and he pours another sugar packet into his tea. “Even the people  _in_ the story decide he’s better off locked up and sentenced to… What sort of sentence would they even give him?”

“I don’t know why you think I know anything about the Vulcan court system.”

Julian smiles, a little embarrassed. “You’ve just… been remarkably well-informed about nearly everything else.”

“Not well-informed, just observant,” Garak corrects.

“Arguably the same thing.”

“Maybe, but I haven’t had the pleasure of  _observing_  a Vulcan court.”

Julian takes a sip of his tea, which is now definitely too sweet. He tries not to make a face and hopes he can spill it later in some fashion that doesn’t make as much of an idiot of him as Garak finding out he’s over-sugared his tea will. “Where did you first see this movie?”

“Romulus, actually. When it was first released.”

“You were in – ?” Julian stops himself when he realizes how silly it is to even ask. “Of course you were. What were you doing there?”

Garak looks quietly pleased and unfurls the bundle of utensils sitting in front of him. “Gardening,” he says.

At that moment, their waitress returns and slides plates in front of them both. She claps her hands together and flashes a big smile. “Anything else I can get for you?”

Julian beams right back at her. “Nothing now, thank you, but I hope you’ll check back.”

She startles and then tries to cover her mouth as she giggles and leans close to Garak. Her voice is just above a whisper, though Julian isn’t sure why she’s bothering to lower it when she knows he doesn’t understand her. Garak laughs politely and then says something in response that makes her pat his shoulder before fluttering off to the kitchen again.

Julian is still staring after her when he asks, “What did she say?”

“That she thinks my boyfriend might be flirting with her.”

“Oh, no,” is the only thing Julian manages to say as he feels all his insides collapse on top of his stomach.

Garak calmly flips through his sandwich, apparently checking for objectionable ingredients. “Don’t worry,” he says, “I told her you weren’t.”

“I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean – wait. Did you tell her I wasn’t flirting or wasn’t your boyfriend?”

“Neither and both. It’s a blessing that both our languages have space for ambiguity and your need to ask that question means she will be wondering too in a minute. Isn’t language fun?” Garak flattens his sandwich a bit and gives Julian an incredibly smug smile.

Julian is a little lost. He should probably be irritated, and this probably shouldn’t be funny, but he also just said something a bit flirty to the waitress while on a date that was not with said waitress. He shrinks into his chair a little. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it the way it sounded, but I probably deserve worse than linguistic ambiguity for that.”

“Probably.”

“Can we pretend that didn’t happen?” He tries a guilty smile as way of conveying continued apology.

“Probably.”

“Well,  _I’m_  going to pretend if you have no greater objection than ‘probably.’  You said  _gardening_  in Romulus? I didn’t know you were a gardener.” Julian takes a very deliberate bite of his sandwich.  _We are going to converse without awkward, dammit._

“There isn’t much to garden in my current situation. I’m sure you’ve noticed the concrete.”

There is also no good way to eat a sandwich while talking and Julian tries to swallow in a hurry so he doesn’t drop the conversational ball. Garak is of course perfectly paced about the whole thing.

“Can’t you get a little window box or something?”

“I’m afraid that really isn’t the right environment.” Garak smiles, presumably at Julian’s ignorance regarding flower boxes, but Julian is ready with at least a conversational connection.

“You know, Miles’ wife is some kind of botanist. Maybe you two should talk.” Keiko was literally the only person Julian knew who he did not talk to before the date, and thus was the only person who did not outright tell him it was a terrible idea. 

“Trying to pawn me off on a married woman after running off with the wait staff didn’t work?” Garak teases. “Where will the madness end?”

Julian is incredibly grateful for the joke, even if it’s at his expense. It’s this sort of thing that made him agree to this in the first place. “Hey, weren’t we going to forget about that?”

“ _You_ were. I don’t recall agreeing to.”

“I’ll be sure to insist upon including you next time.”

“There you go with that ‘next time’ again. When do I get to treat it like an invitation?”

Julian’s chest tightens a bit, but he manages a laugh. “You’re clever; you’ll know.” Everything that comes out of his mouth sounds like flirting unless it’s about flowers and he’s not sure what to do about it, or if he wants to do anything about it at all, so he goes back to flowers. “Tell me about the gardening, though. What did you grow?”

“Orchids.”

“Really?” Julian laughs.

“What’s funny about orchids?”

“I just thought it would have been something… manlier, or more practical. Tomatoes or something.” Julian wants to grab his tea, but remembers the sugar problem and settles on switching the hand he’s holding his sandwich in.

Garak covers this mouth with the back of his hand. “What, exactly,” he swallows and returns to properly composed, “is un-manly about an orchid?”

“I didn’t mean it as an insult!”  _Why did I say tomato? Are potatoes manlier? Is there some sort of manly flower I’m not thinking of?_

“I didn’t take it as one, I’m just curious.” Garak is calm and pleasant, and thankfully, doesn’t sound offended.

“Well, you know, ‘delicate,’ ‘soft,’ ‘pretty’…” With every word, Julian is more and more positive he’s about to be taught something odd about the flowers in Garak’s hometown that will be just as heavy for a date as ‘them verses theirs’ had been.

Garak raises his eyebrows and says slyly, “I have it on good authority that men can be quite pretty.” He accompanies this with a kind of nod in Julian’s direction. Strong yet still indirect implications that Julian is pretty are a little flattering, a little confusing, and tinted with a bit of frustration, but comfortably odd and very  _Garak._ Had this been some other man, Julian would have counted this as a good time to spill his over-sugared tea. When it’s Garak, though, maybe it’s just fun.

Julian straightens his shoulders in exaggerated pride. “Surely you mean men are  _handsome_ though?”

Garak slides his plate off to one side, folds his arms, and leans in over the table. “Tell me, how many ‘handsome’ songs have you heard?”

Julian deflates a little. “Oh. You’re going to work some sort of lesson into this, aren’t you?”

“That’s up to you. It’s only a lesson if someone learns something, not when someone has the intent to teach.”

Julian blinks.  _Is it possible he just memorizes profound-sounding statements for use in charming his dates later? Or does he really just think of these things the moment he says them?_ Rather than ask, though, he leans back in his seat and says, _“_ Well, okay,  _I’m_  willing to learn something. And I can’t say I’ve ever called a song ‘handsome.’”

Garak smiles deviously. “Seen many handsome films?”

“Don’t think so.”

“Would an expertly done painting of man be beautiful, while the man who sat for the painting was handsome?”

“Maybe they’re  _both_  handsome?”

“Why? To avoid  _pretty_ or  _beautiful?_ ”

Julian gives an exaggerated shrug. “I don’t know, why should they both be beautiful?”

“Would you ever call a  _painting_  handsome?”

It’s difficult not to laugh, and Julian decides it’s not worth trying to restrain it. “Well, now I’m not sure! I read somewhere that there’s a name for the way a word starts to lose its meaning if you say it too much and I think I could really apply that about now.”

Garak is practically beaming. “Semantic saturation.”

“Yes!” He’s so pleased that Garak knows the word he almost slams his hand on the table.

“Will you suffer terribly if you hear these words a few times more?” Julian can’t be completely sure Garak didn’t bat his eyelashes.

“I’ll manage, but barely.”

“Good. So, art is beautiful, and nature is beautiful, and half the human race is beautiful, but men are handsome? Do you think they’re trying to separate themselves somehow?”

“You say  _‘themselves’_  like you aren’t part of the whole…” Julian mimes a vague round shape in the air with two bites of a sandwich held between his left thumb and forefinger. “…’men’ group thing.”

“ _I_ didn’t come up with it.”

“Neither did I!”

“But you seem to subscribe to its usage.”

“Maybe I can just say I’m sure you grew some very handsome orchids? Or suits!” Julian sits straight up and pops the rest of the sandwich in his mouth. Between swallows he says, “People call suits handsome, and those are a sort of art you make, aren’t they?”

Garak doesn’t even hesitate. “Suits for  _men._ As soon as it’s a woman’s suit, it’s back to  _beautiful_ ,  _pretty_ , or even _fine_.”

Julian frowns. “This is another ‘them’ and ‘theirs’ isn’t it?”

“There may be slightly more issues at play here, but yes, I think so.”

The issues also carry a bit more weight in the big picture than a Romulan spy movie. Julian is fairly sure these issues have something to do with his apparently culturally-induced discomfort with being put in the same category as an orchid. Those issues and this conversation seem to imply just as much that Garak wouldn’t mind being put in the ‘pretty’ box with some flowers and that he most likely sees Julian in one.   
  
Garak tending to pretty flowers is almost as strange an image as Garak hunched over embroidery and Julian has just as much difficulty holding the picture in his head for long. Still, Julian imagines it would just as fascinating to see the things Garak had grown as much as it had been to see what he’d  _sewn. Maybe they’d be oddly stylish orchids._ Suddenly, he asks, “Have you tried the roof?”

Having not been on board Julian’s train of thought, Garak is lost. “Excuse me?”

“Sorry. For the orchids, I mean. Have you tried getting a space on the roof?”

Garak shakes his head and takes a drink. “No. Frankly, I’m not sure I’d have the time to run a store and give orchids the proper attention, to say nothing of my ability to take you to empty theaters at the same time.”

“Oh.” Julian is more disappointed about flowers than he thought he’d be. “Do you like tailoring more than gardening?”

“It’s not a matter of what I prefer.”

Julian nods solemnly and almost answers himself. “Right, more people want clothing than want flowers.”

“And flowers are only purchased for the ‘pretty’ ones. What would I sell for the ‘handsome’ ones?” Garak’s smile says this is a joke, but Julian latches onto it anyway and lets out a triumphant, “Ha!” that is a little louder than intended.   
  
“Are you sure you haven’t been talking to Quark? Profit over society’s semantics, Garak? Really?”

Garak laughs lightly. “The day that happens, I want you to turn me in to the authorities on any charge you can think of.”

“Are you sure about that?” Julian smiles deviously. “I go to a university; I have witnessed an impressive number of things you wouldn’t want me accusing you of doing in public.”

“Are you sure you’re  _really_ studying medicine?”

“Anatomy appears to be involved. That’s all I’m saying.”

Garak winces a little. “Let’s just agree that I’m not to become like Quark, then, shall we?”

“I wouldn’t be going on dates with Quark, so, yes, agreed.”

Julian is out of sandwich, and he still doesn’t know what to do with his tea, so he’s out of distracting things to put between himself and Garak unless he wants to call attention to the fact that he hasn’t touched the tea. There’s going to be some awkward silence when Garak finishes his drink unless Julian comes up with something to say. He’s about to knock the damn cup off of the table when he remembers something.

“Oh, you said earlier that the movie we saw was a response to another one, didn’t you?”

Garak nods. “Yes, a Vulcan film that was screened widely in Romulus.”

“What was it about?”

“Really?” Garak raises his eyebrows. “You can’t _imagine_?  _Think_ : Vulcans making a film and subjecting Romulans to it. It was about a Romulan spy who adopted Vulcan life entirely, shed his Romulan identity, and eventually helped to spearhead a movement to join Romulans and Vulcans under one – Vulcan – identity. ”

“Did that one get someone murdered too?”

“Considering it’s the far more childish film, you wonder how it didn’t.”

“Have you seen that one as well?”

“Yes. The one we saw is far better.”

Julian has an uncomfortable realization. “Then, doesn’t the fact that our film was produced as a response to one in which the spy becomes Vulcan hint that the ending was meant to be ‘theirs’?”

“How so?”

Julian picks up his knife and uses it to compartmentalize his thoughts on his crumb-covered plate. “Well, okay, the first film was meant to show that Vulcans were better, right?”

Garak nods. “That’s a dreadfully simplistic way to put it, but yes.”

Julian ignores ‘simplistic’ and goes onto the next space on his plate. “And so, if you’re making a film to challenge the ideas of a previous one, wouldn’t you want the outcome to be different? The spy became a Vulcan in the original, and in the one we saw… what does he become? Some sort of hybrid thing and their prisoner?”

“You were very sure it was ‘them’ a little while ago.”

“Yes, but when I remembered that it was a response, that changed things a little. They wouldn’t want to go through all the trouble of making a new film and then come to the same conclusion – that the Romulan should become a Vulcan – they’d want him a prisoner to show that the Vulcans were doing something wrong to a man who was lost. That they were imprisoning someone who could have been a new direction for everyone.”

“And what about what you said earlier? That you liked Sanik and didn’t want him to give up?”

Frustrated, Julian sighs and sets his knife down. “I still  _do_  like that. It’s admirable to keep going even when things aren’t in your favor.”

Garak leans back in surprise. “Is it? You don’t think it’s far more adult, far more reasonable, even far more  _Vulcan,_ to admit when a situation is hopeless?”  

“Maybe in real life,” Julian concedes. “But movies are supposed to be about people in some kind of ideal, aren’t they? Some sort of collective fantasy. Like we’d all like to believe we could be and that we have that kind of drive or will.”

“Not all of us. Some of us are quite happy knowing when to quit.”

Julian shakes his head. “You don’t really feel like that.”

“How would you know?”

“You told me one of Sanik’s words was an identity and one was a prison. And-”

“And they are both different kinds of giving up.”

Julian is a little taken aback. He moves the knife, though it wasn’t in his way, just to have to something to look at that isn’t Garak for a moment.  He tries some caution when he asks,  “Which one do you think is which?”

“Can I propose a theory? I think you’ll find it more valuable.”

Julian shakes his head, sits back in his chair and makes a grand gesture over the table. “By all means. It’s not going to stop you no matter what answer I give.”

“Consider the idea, then, that Sanik himself knew he was saying  _both._ ”

This is typically Garak, and it should result in some very ‘Oh,  _you_ ’ sort of banter. Instead, Julian can actually feel a kind of slow delight flow through him and manifest in an amazed smile. It’s possible that this is a lazy theory and allows someone to just accept both versions of Sanik’s line with no consideration or serious thought, but Julian is just so thrilled to consider that Sanik might be capable of amusing himself with dark wordplay while waiting for a trial that how lazy it might be doesn’t matter.

“That’s…” Julian tries to find the right word while Garak smiles smugly from the other side of the table. There isn’t a word appropriate enough and he just laughs. “Damn, why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”

“Wasn’t it more fun to talk it out? What would I have done with you all evening if I’d said that at the end of the film?”

“So you were going to let me suffer for the sake of being able to buy me a sandwich?”

“That’s not quite the way I’d put it.”

“Well, congratulations, it worked.”

Fluffy skirted waitress returns, this time with less cheer and more determined glances at Julian and Garak’s faces. “Anything else I can get you? Dessert?”

Garak nods toward Julian and the waitress immediately follows the gesture.

“Oh, no, no, I shouldn’t be eating dessert this late.” He motions back to Garak, sending the waitress’ gaze back where it started. “But, if you want something, I’m happy to sit here.”

“It’s just as well that I don’t.” He grins at the waitress. “That’s everything for us, miss, thank you.”

She looks a bit confused and slightly disappointed, but goes back to smiling. “Sure, let me just get your plates and I’ll be back with your check.” She hovers in front of Julian for an extra second. “Are you done with your tea?”

“Oh, no, just leave it, I’ll… sit here a bit.” This way, there’s no pressure, and it doesn’t look like he’s in a hurry to leave.

As the waitress slips away, Julian makes eye contact with Garak.  _Come on, show me you noticed that._  Garak smirks, and Julian strains to hold in laughter until the waitress is well into the kitchen somewhere.

“God, she’s trying to figure it out, isn’t she?”

Garak is clearly pleased with himself. “I hope so.”

“We could make a real mess of this, you know.” Julian plants his elbows on the table.

“Be careful.”

“No, I’m willing to play at this, just listen, if  _you_  say something to  _her_ , and then, on our way out-” Julian reaches for the knife he was using earlier in hopes of using it to emphasize his plan.

“I meant you’re going to-”

There is no knife and Julian’s tea sloshes across the table. He throws his arms across the table almost instinctively and tries to form some kind of dam with his hands to keep it from getting too far.

Garak plugs the holes in the dam at Julian’s wrists with a few napkins. “A mess, you said?”

“Shut up.”

Another waitress comes by seconds later with a thick towel. She drops it in the middle of the lake behind Julian’s hands and waits for him to drag his palms over it before she mops up the whole table.

“I’m so sorry,” Julian says. He has to resist the Deep Dish Nine urge to help her wipe the table down.

She shakes her head. “No big deal, happens all the time.”

Thanks to tea, he and Garak are standing when their original waitress returns with the bill. She’s a bit perplexed and offers the bill while shooting distracted glances over Julian’s shoulder at the wet table. He grins at her while Garak snatches the bill out from between her fingers.

“Never a dull moment,” Julian tells her.

“I imagine.”

“Can’t take me anywhere.”

She doesn’t quite know what to make of that, but tucks some hair behind her ear and smiles at him.  ”He doesn’t appear to mind.”  
  
“It’s sad really. Poor bastard has no idea what he’s in for hanging around me.”

Garak returns quite quickly from the front register. “Ready?”

Julian shrugs. “Sure.”

Garak leads the way to the door and thanks the baffled waitress again. She smiles and wishes them a good evening as they leave, adding something Julian can’t understand while Garak holds the door open. Garak gives the waitress a polite nod and steps out with Julian into the rain.

It’s not torrential rain, but it’s more than enough to be annoying.

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Julian says, pulling up his hood, “but it’d be good if we hurried back.”

“Agreed.” Garak doesn’t have a hood, but he pulls a scarf from somewhere in his coat and drapes it around his neck.

There are still very few people out as Julian and Garak avoid puddles and leaky awnings. The rain does enhance the glow of the buildings around them though, and if Julian had more than a thin hood to protect him from the increasing rain, he’d stop to enjoy the scenery. Garak is surprisingly quiet on their way back, especially considering Julian’s tea disaster. Julian expected at least a little teasing and feels odd going home in silence.

“What did she say to you this time?” Julian calls through the rain. Garak is just behind him, but hoods and scarves and rain muffle the conversation.

“She told me-” Garak hops to a dry spot in a large puddle. “-to ‘ _enjoy my dessert_.’”

Julian nearly falls over as he turns toward Garak. “Does that mean what it sounds like?”

“Yes.” Garak steps up out of the street and adjusts the scarf around his neck. “It’s a common expression that just happened to work well coming from a waitress. Though it is a little crude; I’m surprised she said it to someone she doesn’t know.”

Julian, now walking backwards in the rain, tries to spin it positively. “Well, she decided I wasn’t flirting then! No harm done!”

“You might not get so lucky another time.” It almost sounds like a threat.

They round the last corner before home and Julian realizes he’ll have to end this in some non-awkward manner. He doesn’t have time to go on any other sort of mini-date if he wants to get any sleep tonight, but he’s not sure what is supposed to happen now. If he were a girl – or even if Garak were – there would be some very easy rituals ( _goodnight kiss, it was fun, call me later_ ), but this is still uneasy territory and with Sanik and orchids mixing in with ‘I’ve just been on a date with a man,’ Julian doesn’t know what he’s expected to do.

Julian also doesn’t have the sense to stop walking backwards and Garak snagging his wrist and pulling him forward is all that keeps him from flipping over the top of Quark’s recycling bin.

“I’m beginning to wonder how you function without an escort,” Garak says while Julian regains his footing.

“I was doing well until the tea. It’s some kind of domino effect.”

Garak takes hold of Julian’s shoulders and steers him past Deep Dish Nine and toward the door to the apartments. “Permit me to get you another ten feet so I don’t find you in the obituaries tomorrow.”

Julian laughs and shrugs him off, but continues on the path to the door. As he and Garak approach, Julian hears the old security cameras twist toward them.  _So Odo is awake, and he’s making sure Garak isn’t assaulting me on our shared doorstep._   _Fantastic._

He has to struggle with the key, but with some force and an uncomfortable angle, the lock gives and the door creaks open to let them into the waiting area outside the leasing office that contains their mailboxes. Garak is still behind him, but, as weird as it feels,  Garak has to come this way too, so there’s no reason for him not to be.

Julian pockets his keys and turns around. “Erm, what floor are you on?”

“The basement.” 

“Oh. I didn’t know there were people down there.”

“I’m sure that’s a line from a horror movie of some sort, but now you understand my flower box problem.”

Julian winces. “Sorry, I didn’t know.”

“Nothing to apologize for.” He holds his hand out toward Julian’s. “May I?”

Even though he’s not totally sure what Garak is asking for, Julian offers his hand. Garak seems disproportionately pleased and it only occurs to Julian after he’s let Garak take his hand that it might be a more significant gesture where Garak’s from.  _Not that it means nothing here…_

“Is it possible you’d do this again?”

Julian laughs. “What number would that one be?”

“What number do you like?”

Julian doesn’t feel as strange having a conversation while Garak holds onto his hand as he imagined he should be. “I’m afraid what number I like doesn’t matter so much as what number I think I can handle.”

Garak’s eyebrows raise in an expression of pleased curiosity. “How is that?”

Julian shrugs and can’t help smiling. “Well, going by the logic that this was not a first date based on what it did and did not contain, the other dates would be defined that way too, and if I told you our next one was number six, I’d be expected to have a lot more things figured out by then than I currently do.”

“Not having been on dates three through five, I can’t tell you what would ‘be expected.’”

Something unpleasant crosses Julian’s mind, and even though it sounds mad, he can’t completely be sure it wouldn’t happen until he asks. “Would going on date four mean I had to follow through with date three?”

Garak frowns and looks genuinely hurt. “ Of course not! You really think I’d do something like that? Frankly, that’d be more like dates with Dukat.”

Relieved, Julian smiles a bit more openly than he intended and looks down at Garak’s hand still gently holding on to his own. “Sorry. Just checking to see that I understand the rules of this game. You’ll recall I’ve never played it the _‘non-linear and with a man_ ’ way before.”

“I’m disappointed that you view it as a game, but I am open to working with that.” Garak inclines his head, almost bows, to look Julian in the eye. “You still haven’t told me if you’ll play again.”

“I’m not sure yet,” Julian confesses. He sees a little concern flare up in Garak’s expression and adds, “But that doesn’t mean I’m not taking it seriously.”

The disappointment on Garak’s face is gone after only a second or two and is quickly replaced with a smile. It seems to have the same function as his customer service smile – to mask some other less pleasant feeling – but this is much warmer and, despite covering something up, is genuine. “Take whatever time you need,” he says gently. He glances at their hands, and seems to make a mental note. “Though if I may ask a favor?”

“I suppose?” Julian is a little afraid to offer this as quickly as he offered his hand.

“I would greatly like an answer either way. I think we can agree being left to wonder would be awkward for everyone?”

“Of course. I’ll tell you, no matter what I decide. Promise.”

Garak pulls Julian’s hand up and for a second Julian is worried he’ll try to kiss it, but he instead he briefly holds their hands at the base of his neck between his collar bones. The scarf prevents actual skin contact, but Julian can still feel collar bones with the back of his fingers.  
  
“I appreciate it. I won’t keep you any longer.” Garak releases Julian’s hand and it suddenly feels a little cold. “And thank you again for your company. Perhaps I’ll run into you at lunch tomorrow?”

Julian barely nods. “Sure.”

“I look forward to it.” He bows again which Julian should find weirder than he does. “Goodnight, Julian.”

“Goodnight.” Julian stands in the hallway wondering if there’s any significance to holding someone’s hand near your neck while he watches Garak disappear down the stairs. He remembers talking with Miles while traipsing up and down the stairs here to repair electrical shorts and thinks for a moment that the security camera in this building has been seeing all of his most important conversations lately.

 


	6. Shady

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julian deals with Wednesday. Garak deals with his own brain.

There's been such a buildup to Tuesday, Julian had forgotten that Wednesday would bring just as much fuss, if not more. Two hours into work, he is deeply regretting not calling in sick. Already this morning he's been enduring Nerys' stares, ignoring Quark's incessant beckoning to come talk, and trying unsuccessfully to dodge Jadzia.

 

Predictably, as Julian is wiping down a table at one of the booths along the wall, Jadzia casually begins cleaning the one next to him.

 

“Surprised to see you today!” she says brightly. “The last time you were out late, you were like a corpse in here.”

 

Julian tries not to look at her. “What makes you think I was out late?”

 

She shrugs and lets a sly smile cross her lips. “Well, I  _may_  have been listening in on Nerys' morning coffee conversation with Odo...”

 

“ _Odo?_ ”

 

“Well, you know he watches  _all_ the tapes. It's some real dedication, if you ask me.”

 

Julian frowns and keeps wiping circles with the rag in this hand. “Has anyone ever considered that Odo might just be nosy and not actually gruffly ensuring our security at all?”

 

Jadzia grins, which makes Julian's frown a bit hard to maintain. “ _I_ told Nerys that he might be some kind of voyeur, and that there might be something  _interesting_ hiding under all that gruff. I suggested she do a little  _investigating_  of her own.”

 

Anywhere else in the world, perhaps talking to anyone but Jadzia, and this would be easy to ignore. But something about Deep Dish Nine gives even Julian an appetite for gossip. Plus, today it could be useful to get everyone away from what he did on Tuesday. “You did, did you? And?”

 

“She punched me!” Jadzia laughs. Her laugh is frustratingly lovely and that Jadzia can apparently find fun even in getting punched by Nerys is part of why Julian likes her so much. Jadzia switches to a table on the other side of Julian, putting herself between him and the view from the register. She leans in close, grinning. “But this isn't about  _Odo_ , it's about you going out with  _Garak.”_

 

 _So much for hoping she'd get distracted by unrelated gossip._ Julian sighs and tries to look as absorbed in cleaning a table as possible.“ _This_  isn't about anything. I went, I had fun, I came back, no one died.”

 

“Oh, come on, Julian! People are curious! You said you had  _fun?”_

 

“Yes, I did. Just keep it down, okay? I really don't want to talk about it three hundred times today.”

 

Jadzia pretends to be offended. “Well, if  _you_  won't talk to me, I'll just ask  _Garak_  when he comes in then!” She gives Julian a tight mischievous smile.

 

“Have fun with that,” Julian teases. “He'll only lie to you.”

 

“Oooo, that just means that you like them  _shady.”_ She wiggles her fingers at him, laughs and flings her towel over her shoulder as she strolls back toward the register.

 

Julian scrubs the table angrily repeating ' _shady_ ' in his mind over and over until he hears Odo over his shoulder. “Just how long do you plan to shine that one table, Mister Bashir?”

 

Julian's response is immediate, and a comes out a little angrier than he intends. “As long as I want. Or do you want to report  _this_ to Nerys as well?”

 

Odo looks a little surprised and huffs, and Julian doesn't blame him, but they say nothing else to each other. Odo gives Julian a combination of a suspicious glare and a nod and continues on his way to the back.

 

Odo may have been right to say something, though, because the booth Julian has been cleaning now resembles a mirror. He moves on to another table.

 

Glancing over his shoulder, he makes eye contact with Quark through the glass doors that separate Deep Dish Nine and Quark's bar. Quark immediately brightens and starts making flailing motions again.

 

Julian sighs and gazes beseechingly a t the ceiling. _Is it lunch time yet?_

 

_****_

 

 

During his break, Julian gives in to the persistent waving from next door and slips through the doors to see Quark. The evening crowd won't be in for a few hours yet, so it's still a bit empty. There is a Dabo game going on, but judging by the expression on the girl who has been hired to run the table, it's not a particularly stimulating game. Julian considers taking a look at the table, _And talking to that girl,_  but there's a sudden tug on his arm that nearly sends him cracking his head on the bar. Quark grins at him when he recovers.

 

“God, what do you  _want_ , Quark?”

 

“Can't a man be concerned about his friend?”

 

Julian raises an eyebrow as he takes a seat. “Are we  _friends_ now? I thought I was just your emergency med kit.”

 

Quark presses his hand to his chest. “Doctor, I'm hurt. After _all_  we've been through.”

 

“We haven't been through  _anything_. Are you sure you haven't mistaken me for  _Odo_?”

 

“Actually, Odo is what I wanted to talk about!” Quark leans over the bar and grins. The effect is a bit like a heavily upholstered orange gargoyle.

 

“Why would I know anything about Odo?”

 

“Not  _about_ him, he just spotted you coming home last night, and  _I_  thought-”

 

Julian frowns and stands up. “You know, I'm starting to wonder if no one in this building has anything better to do than follow what I do with Garak. Is my free time  _that_  exciting? Should I let you all watch me shuffle cards or do my laundry?”

 

“Hey, hey, come on. Don't kill the bartender.” Quark spreads his arms in what Julian assumes is an attempt to look benign and trustworthy, but coupled with his sharp smile only looks sinister. “I'm only a messenger, after all. I just thought you could benefit from some information I have.”

 

“If you're all watching me as closely as you say, you know I don't have the money to drop on ridiculous  _'information'_.”

 

“Oh, no, no, no, Doctor. This is on me.” The ridiculous nickname is out full force today as Quark circles the bar and slides up next to Julian, settling an arm on his back. “After all, we're _friends_.”

 

“Okay. Make it quick, then. I'm only on break.” Julian feels Quark press on his back and he gives in to the push and begins walking with him around the bar.

 

“If you'll recall, before you all got here,” - Quark waves dismissively toward the doors to Deep Dish Nine - “I was serving more than my daily recommended dose of Cardassians. And let me tell you, I have some seen some things in my life,  _boy have I_ , but those Cardassians, Doctor, they  _know_  how to occupy a bar.” Quark positions them at the end of the Dabo table, across from the poor Bajoran girl who is trying to keep the players engaged with a rather lackluster round. She's distractingly well-endowed and her hair is ridiculously fluffy, but that doesn't seem to be getting anyone's attention but Julian's.

 

“Quark, I really don't want to hear about how slimy  _you_  find  _Garak_.” Frankly, that Quark might think of anyone as slimy, shady, or otherwise suspect is really a surprise, considering that Quark has historically defined all those terms and then some. That he'd find something objectionable about someone who is habitually nothing but polite, clean, and unobtrusive is rather hilarious.

 

Quark laughs and nearly nearly bows. “You misunderstand my intentions! I just wanted to you to be  _prepared_! Odo mentioned that he saw something  _significant_  and I wanted to let you know: These people are  _monsters_  in the bedroom. Now, if you're into that kind of thing, you know this isn't only a bar. We can accommodate upstairs here, we have-”

 

Julian can feel some sort of mortified disgust boil through him from the spot on his back where Quark's hand rests and he nearly shivers. “ _Quark_.”

 

“... and I know that can be a bit of a challenge for some couples, so we have provided-”

 

“Quark, there is  _no_  set of circumstances that would make me sleep with anyone  _in your bar_.”

 

“...all had tests, so we can assure good clean fun for everyone involved! But of course, if you're not interested, we can-”

 

“ _I'm not_!”

 

“Oh.” Quark tsk's and shakes his head. “Well, why didn't you say something?”

 

The Dabo girl stifles a laugh across the table and makes eye contact with Julian. He gives her an apologetic smile. Quark unfortunately witnesses this and elbows Julian hard in the ribs.

 

“Nice selection, Doctor. Leeta's working now, but stop by later and she can tell you more about the Cardassians. Or maybe you'd like to forget  _allllll_  about those people now? Eh?”

 

Julian keeps his eyes on Leeta, even as he's talking to Quark. He also decides to ignore several of the implications of what Quark has just said and skip right to what Quark had claimed he wanted to talk about.

 

“What did Odo see that he thought was significant?” Across the table, Julian can swear he sees Leeta wink.

 

“Just some little gesture,” Quark replies. “Nothing Earth-shattering.” Leeta somehow manages to give the full attention of her hands to the game and the player to her left, but her sly expression is aimed at Julian.

 

“Gesture?” Julian raises his eyebrows, and Leeta expertly blends pointing between herself and Julian in with her theatrical wheel spinning.

 

“You don't know?” It's possible Julian is imagining Leeta mouthing, ' _You_ ', ' _me_ ', and  _'later._ ' It's also possible he should ignore it even if she is.

 

“No?”  _Maybe I should just talk to her and make sure she -_

 

Quark grabs Julian's hand and yanks his gaze from Leeta. He pulls Julian's hand to his throat, not quite where Garak had done it, but clearly meant to mimic it. It had felt warm and compellingly odd from Garak, but from Quark, it's a bit gross, and Julian snaps his hand away.

 

“What are you doing?!”

 

Quark's eyes practically sparkle. “So you  _do_  already know about it.”

 

“I- What is it?”

 

“ _That_  information, Doctor, you'll have to get from that source you  _aren't_  sleeping with, or else pay for. I can't give away all my merchandise for free.”

 

Julian casts another glance at Leeta and then shakes his head. “Thank you anyway, Quark. I should be getting back to work.”

 

“We'll see you later,  _Doctor_.”

 

****

 

Garak's arrival at lunch is both a huge relief and ties Julian's stomach in a knot. Knots or no, though, Julian still slips out of the back with his lunch and glides into the chair across from Garak at the table against the wall.

 

“Glad I haven't scared you off,” Garak says.

 

Julian smiles over the top of the brown bag containing his rather sad lunch. “You should be more careful with this whole having lunch with me thing - the neighbors will start to talk.”

 

Garak returns the smile quite genuinely. “We wouldn't want that.”

 

“Turns out the neighbors, though?” Julian nods toward Quark's, “Are phenomenally nosy.”

 

“What's the problem now? Have I lost him some sort of bet again?” Garak starts in on his salad and Julian's cheese sandwich is looking a little dumb in comparison.

 

“He was trying to tell me about the things he's seen Cardassians do in his bar.”

 

Garak raises an eyebrow with a fork full of salad half-way to his mouth. “Which I'm  _sure_  was somehow relevant to you.”

 

“It was kind of slimy, really.” The bread on his sandwich is stale, which he knew when he threw it together this morning, but had somehow hoped he could ignore. There's a cup of yogurt in his bag though, and he's reasonably sure it's still safe to eat, so he grabs the plastic spoon he swiped from the back and rips the top off of the yogurt cup. It looks like yogurt rather than cottage cheese, so Julian assumes it’s safe. “He seemed to think he was doing me a favor by offering me some of his special 'suites' upstairs. Though he did mention talking to Odo about the thing with my hand.”

 

Garak leans to one side to look around Julian's lunch bag. “What did the Constable do to your hand?”

 

“No, no, he was just watching security footage last night, and he saw us come back.” Julian puts his spoon down with the intent of mimicking what Garak did the night before on himself, but looking at his own hands he realizes the difficulty in holding his own hand properly. “He saw the thing you did with the...” He presses the back of two curled fingers to his collarbones.

 

“Oh.” There's a pause that Julian almost jumps to fill before Garak continues. “I apologize. I wasn't thinking.”

 

“I didn't mind!” Julian protests. He picks up his spoon again and starts in on his yogurt. “I just don't know what it means, but I guess more than a few people who are overly-invested in my life  _do_. I was hoping you would tell me without demanding money first.”

 

Garak raises an eyebrow and smirks. “I think we've already had the 'Garak won't become Quark' conversation, haven't we?”

 

Julian grins. “Sure, but I don't know that I wasn't sworn in to a secret collarbone club, and I might owe dues already.”

 

“Nothing of the sort.” Garak sets down his fork and slides his salad off to his left against the wall. “It is something I forgot you wouldn't know, though, hence the apology.”

 

Julian is a bit nervous that Garak needs to preface the explanation of what this was with an explanation of 'I forgot', but tries to joke it away. “We didn't get engaged in front of a bunch of mailboxes and  _Odo_ , did we?”

 

“Of course not. It's... a very  _fond_  gesture, that's all.” There’s a tiny hint of a wince in Garak’s voice.

 

“Which explains why it felt weird coming from Quark,” Julian grumbles, returning to his yogurt.

 

Garak makes a face like he's eaten something spoiled. “ _Quark_?  _Quark_  tried that on  _you_?”

 

Julian waves it off. “He wasn't expressing any meaning behind it.” He swallows s a large spoonful of yogurt. “Hell, if I can assume you gave me a textbook example, then he did it completely wrong. It still felt kind of slimy, though.”

 

“Well, yes, it's not a  _handshake_.”

 

And here is a place for Julian to get to the bottom of what he gave his hand over to. “So, it's definitely for people who are close or something?” He laughs a little, trying to keep any references to the date light. “Was that a Cardassian goodnight kiss?”

 

Garak smiles in return, and it's oddly reminiscent of Jadzia in both how it looks and how Julian feels sort of fluttery about it. “Not quite. That would have been a bit different. I'm afraid if you want to see  _that_  one, you'll have to  _'figure things out'_  and tell me you're up for number six after all.”

 

Julian shakes his head and scrapes the sides of his yogurt cup with his spoon. Somehow, Garak's comment is more amusing to him than it is a hopeful push for an answer on the subject of another date. “Sorry, not quite yet. Right now, I'm just interested in what I already  _did_. I get that it's not a casual thing, so it's not a hug, but you said it isn't a kiss either.”

 

“Well, no, why would it have to be either?”

 

“I'm just trying to put in a context I understand.”

 

Garak still has not returned to his salad. “The context changes, though, with those just as much as what I did. People hug their parents, their lovers, their children, their siblings, their close friends. Some people kiss all those people too. They don’t mean the same thing each time. This is similar, though it's not appropriate for family.”

 

“This  _would_  be significantly stranger if I found out you saw me as a brother, yes.”

 

The muffled laugh this gets from Garak is not dramatic or even obtrusive, but it is by far the least dignified thing Julian has ever seen Garak do and it's kind of thrilling to see that the elegant and proper outer layer of him isn't impenetrable.

 

“Yes, well,” Garak says, struggling to recover from the laugh. “Maybe I can demonstrate something and it will help you understand?”

 

Julian shrugs - “Okay, sure.” - and takes a final spoonful of his yogurt.

 

“So if we pretend you have some kind of weapon – a small knife, a nail, a razor, a -”

 

Julian pulls the spoon out of his mouth and holds it out. “A plastic spoon.”

 

“...That will work. If you'll hold that less like a utensil and – if I may?” He reaches for Julian's hand, and Julian nods as re-grips the spoon.

 

Garak draws Julian's hand up to his neck again and the rest of Deep Dish Nine is treated to the image of Garak holding Julian's hand against his throat while Julian clutches a spoon. Julian's fingers are curled around the spoon with the backs of them resting gently against Garak's collarbones just as they had the night before. Julian feels Garak swallow against his hand and with the way his hand is positioned, the spoon is now a bright white nearly-horizontal line across Garak's neck.

 

“Oh.”

 

“Obviously, if you felt like slitting my throat with a plastic spoon, I'd be blatantly offering you the opportunity.”

 

“So, even without the weapon, this is a gesture of trust, then?”  _I'm not sure why you'd take someone who felt the need to arm themselves in your presence on a date, though..._

 

“That's part of it. It's where we think it came from, anyway.”

 

It's strange to feel Garak's voice in his throat as he's talking. “So it's... ' _I like you, here is your chance to murder me_?'”

 

Garak places Julian's hand back on the table. “Something like that.”

 

Julian sighs and flips the spoon around between his fingers. “And then what's the rest of it? You couldn't have thought I needed to be reassured that you  _trusted me_.”

 

“No, it's more the bringing part of someone else close to vital parts of you that is important, which is why I thought the weapon demonstration would make sense.” He slides his salad back in front of him and for an odd moment, Julian imagines how the fork in Garak's hand would look held against his own neck. “It's a bit odd trying to explain something as ingrained as this. I can avoid repeating it in the future, though, if I'm ever in a position to consider doing it again.”

 

“Don't do that. I didn’t mind – I still don’t - I just wanted to know. I'm not completely sure I understand, but I'll get it. It's bound to show up in a film or something somewhere, right?” Julian grins, even with the image of a fork against his neck.

 

Garak continues looking very interested in his salad, though he smiles and his eyes flick up to Julian for just a second or two. “Several. I'd be quite happy to take you to some.”

 

“Offer noted. I still need some time, though. If we can continue the conversation without my decision...”

 

“Of course we can.”

 

****

 

 

A very strange thing happens for the rest of his post-lunch day as people who were previously very against Julian being involved in any way with Garak start elbowing him, teasing him, or ‘oooooo’-ing at him. Jadzia and Quark are the worst culprits still, but even Nerys and Mister Sisko give him significant looks. He doesn’t know what’s happened to ‘ _This is a bad idea, Julian_ ,’ but it’s been replaced with ‘ _Oooh, give us the details, Julian_ ’, and he is less than thrilled about it.

 

Why should this be that exciting? What was different about this than every other thing he's ever done with every other girl he's ever seen?

 

_Garak not being a girl springs to mind._

 

Mercifully, no one in Julian's night class knows much about him, let alone about him as he relates to Garak, so he’s spared the sounds of his classmates devolving into nosy teenagers about it like his coworkers had. He’s also spared the full length of the class when his professor announces that she’ll be taking a week-long vacation starting early the next morning and on into next weekend, thus canceling their next class meeting. Julian has a new double-thick pile of reading to do, but on the plus side, an hour is clipped off the length of his class tonight and now there’s nothing taking up his Wednesday night next week.

 

_Not that there’s anything exciting to do on a Wednesday._

 

Thanks to the earlier hour, the walk back from class feels fresh and new, even though he’s taken this route for nearly a whole semester. There are people out that he doesn’t see every day, businesses are still open, the light is subtly different and there's a feeling of getting away with something and experiencing something he isn't meant to that makes everything feel new and fresh.

 

One of the businesses still open is Garak’s, though there are few people looking for a tailor this late and the shop appears deserted.  _I could stop in and …_ still  _not give him an answer. Damn._

 

He'd certainly had fun with Garak, but whether he wanted to continue going on 'dates' and whether it was fair to go on them while he knew Garak's feelings ( _Mostly? Probably?_ ), but not his own, Julian didn't know.

 

Quark’s is still very open, and while Garak is probably in the back winding down, tallying receipts, and contemplating tea, Quark’s place is just getting started. Julian isn't about to consider even going near Quarks, but then the front door opens and the noise and the orange glow from inside spill onto the street, followed by Leeta, the Dabo girl he'd seen earlier, who also appears to have been given an early reprieve this evening. Julian straightens his shoulders. It possibly won’t be the wisest use of an extra hour, but…

 

“Leeta!”

 

She looks around – probably for someone she actually  _knows_  – and then suddenly recognizes Julian. “Oh, it’s you again! The pretty doctor from next door!”

 

Julian's posture falters a little. “He’s told everyone that, hasn’t he?”

 

Leeta grins. “Yes. The fun thing is I think he thinks we  _believe_  him.”

 

Julian sighs, relieved. “Thank goodness you don’t. I’m terrified it’s going to get someone in trouble eventually. Erm, I’m Julian, sorry.”

 

“Well,  _Julian_ , did you come to play? They started up another game just as I left.” She nods toward the door behind her.

 

“No, actually. I thought I could talk to  _you_. Quark sort of got in the way before.”

 

Leeta turns out to be something like a flirting amplifier, because Julian's pale attempts to just _lead in_  to flirting turn into full-on dramatic suggestions in Leeta's hands. “Oh,” she says, fluttering her lashes and holding a hand to her chest, “do I look  _ill_? Is it an  _emergency_?” She attempts some fake coughs and Julian can't even be angry that everyone who works at Quark's is now calling him a doctor.

 

“I've been known to make house calls.” _God, did I just say that?_

 

“It should probably be  _your_  house,” Leeta says, drawing the back of her hand to her forehead. “I'm feeling faint already.”

 

_Oh._

 

****

 

This is a little strange and arguably one of the quickest spontaneous encounters Julian has ever had, but it's also one of the easiest because Leeta is so confident and at ease. Leeta talks a lot about being a Dabo Girl and wanting to open a shop. Julian has no significant input on either of those topics that he hasn't gleaned from Garak, but Leeta doesn't really mind. She doesn't say anything difficult, deep, or even new, and that is fine. Julain talks about his classes or customers at work. She doesn't understand much about his classes and doesn't have much to say about the use of colors in Romulan spy movies or the last book he read, and that's fine too.

 

Leeta's fun to kiss because she does everything like it's a new game that she's excited to try. She isn't shy about lavishing attention on someone she's had half and hour's worth of small talk with, she isn't childish, and she isn't shy.

 

Sleeping with Leeta not only feels good, but Julian is comfortable with it on every level, it is not complicated or awkward, and it is nothing like worrying about gendered adjectives or the merits of one word over the other. This is a game Julian knows the rules to and it doesn't have any mysterious hand-holding or doing things out of order to consider. He knows the order this story goes in already and how long each chapter is. Whether or not he's attracted to Leeta isn't an identity-crisis and Miles won't give him hell about her. In fact, even though Julian only met Leeta today, Miles will likely congratulate him if Julian chooses to report on how he really spent his Wednesday night study time.

 

The only issue here is that he's been comparing sleeping with Leeta to talking to Garak and the implications of that are positively bizarre.

 

Leeta elbows him when they've been silent for several minutes. “You gonna fall asleep on me?”

 

“No, just my brain coming back online.”

 

“Oh, that's  _terrible_!” Leeta gives him an exaggerated pout and shoves him jokingly. “Usually I can deactivate brains for a whole twenty minutes! My reputation will be ruined!”

 

“Sorry to disappoint. Maybe I'll do better next time?” Julian flashes a smile and is actually rather pleased that he doesn't have to hastily reconsider saying 'next time'. If Leeta would be up for it, so would he.

 

Leeta grins. “I don't know, what would my mother think if I told her I slept with a  _doctor?”_ She says 'doctor' in the same tone people usually reserve for 'Dabo Girl' and Julian laughs.

 

“Preferable to telling someone you slept with Quark, I hope.”

 

Suddenly, Leeta is less chipper. “Well... yes, I suppose.”

 

Julian runs the conversation through his mind three times and still cannot figure out where he went wrong. He has one logical conclusion to make, though it's a little hard to stomach.

 

“Do you...Quark?” It's also apparently hard to  _verbalize_.

 

Thankfully, Leeta laughs so hard that she snorts and the mattress shakes. “Quark?! Goodness, no! But...” She leans close to Julian's ear as though someone else could possibly hear what she's about to say. “Can you keep a secret?”

 

Frankly, she could have said something about bone fractures or mozzarella cheese and Julian still would have answered, “Absolutely.”

 

“I've got kind of a thing for Rom!” She giggles like a teenager the second she finishes saying it and Julian slowly falls onto his back to stare at the ceiling, suddenly wishing he were instead deciphering hand-gestures and Romulan experimental film. The gorgeous Dabo Girl has a thing for Quark's odd-looking brother who very possibly is the first person to function on less brain than was generally considered required.

 

Julian tries to will the tiles in his ceiling to fall out. “This may sound like a stupid question, but-”

 

“Because I'm not going to wait forever.”

 

Julian blinks and looks back at her. Her schoolgirl giggle is gone, and she's sitting up, apparently comfortable since she's making no effort to cover herself. This should be tantalizing, but it's just oddly human. She smiles at him, less flirtatious and silly than she's been all evening.

 

“I came with you because I can't wait around for someone to respond forever, and you seemed kind of sweet. Kind of fun. I thought I might as well enjoy myself without him, because I've tried to give him hints, and...” She pokes Julian's chest with some suggestive sass. “And I think I'm pretty damn good with a hint.”

 

He laughs and nods. “You're not bad,” he says.

 

“Well, then you know that when I say I've given him as many opportunities to consider me as humanly possible, I mean it.”

 

“Quark always says Rom's a bit – and I mean no offense by this – slow? Maybe he--”

 

Leeta looks a bit like Julian has just hit her and huffs. “ _Rom?_ Do you know who fixes the music when it starts skipping in there? Rom. Who reconfigured the whole bar when the only thing coming from the tap was a freak spurt of cranberry juice? Rom. Who fixes the registers when they jam and adjusts those sensor things in the restrooms so the toilets stop flushing every thirty seconds?  _Rom. And he used a spatula to do it._ He's a _genius._ ”

 

Julian bites his lip. “I... had no idea.”

 

“To be fair, I suppose no one really knows. He’s not the kind to brag.” Leeta shrugs and fidgets with the edge of the sheet over her lap. “But, maybe they're right. He hasn't noticed  _me_  yet.”

 

Julian sits up, and can hardly believe he's having this conversation. “I'm sure he has. I think you're hard to miss. Maybe he's just shy.”

 

“Well, he should say something,” Leeta grumbles. “Even if it's just that he doesn't like me.”

 

“Why wouldn't he?” The question is absolutely genuine. He's admittedly not spent much time around Leeta, but what he's seen of her is lovely and kind of charmingly silly. “Or, why not say something spelling it out yourself?”

 

“I don't know!” She nearly tears the bit of Julian's sheet in her hands. “But it's frustrating, and I know I've got to stop trying to send hints into deep space when they're not being heard, you know? Make a decision and move on, Leeta! Get a life!”

 

“Right.”  _Why am I even here? How long do I sit here and tell her that someone else will definitely want to sleep with her later? Am I meant to be making her 'forget all about that foolish man' or telling her to follow her dreams? Did she just use me for some entertainment? Did I just do the same to her?_

 

Leeta shoves her shoulder into Julian's. “You're so sweet, Julian, putting up with this!”

 

 _Maybe I can salvage this?_  “I don't suppose there's some sort of reward being offered?”

 

She shoves him again and smiles. “You're cute. Let's think about it.” She slides off the side of Julian's bed and looks at his clock. “Is that really the time?”

 

“Yes?”

 

“Wow, I should go. I had a bunch of errands to do before you showed up!” She pokes him again. “You stole my Wednesday!” She is perfectly content to walk around the room naked retrieving her clothing and makes it out of Julian's bedroom almost fully dressed well before he's even found his jeans and pulled the legs right side out.

 

“Julian, what's this?” she calls from the other room.

 

_Oh, dammit._

 

Julian hops both into his jeans and into the next room and sees Leeta holding the one souvenir he's kept from childhood – his teddy bear. She's got the bear in front of her face and her fingernails look too severe to be safe near his deteriorating fur. Julian winces whens she smooshes the toy a little and makes a silly voice for him, “Hello, I'm Mister Bear!”

 

He corrects her with “ _Kukalaka_ ,” without even thinking.

 

Leeta blinks. “Bless you?”

 

“It's his name,” Julian says sheepishly. “I kept him from when I was a kid. Just couldn't get rid of him.”

 

Leeta releases her scary fingernail grip on Kukalaka and turns him over to look at his face. “He's cute,” she says. “It's nice that you held onto him.” She mercifully puts him back where she found him rather than skewering him again and gathers the bags she'd dropped at Julian's door when they'd stumbled in a little over two hours ago.

 

“I should be off, but thanks for the fun!” She hugs Julian and kisses his cheek, which strikes Julian as weirdly distant, considering. “You should come into Quark's more often, so we can talk. Maybe have some more fun.”

 

“I'll see if I have time,” Julian says.  _What? 'See if you have_ _time_ _'?_ _What_ _?_

 

“You're funny.” She ruffles his hair, which no one has done to him since he was still considered young enough to own a teddy bear.

 

He opens the door for her and she skips out as though she had just come over to borrow a cup of sugar or his biology notes. “Goodnight, Julian!”

 

“...Goodnight.”

 

When he can't see her hair bobbing down the stairs anymore, he closes the door and looks at Kukalaka.

 

“I'm glad you didn't see much of that,” Julian says. Talking to a teddy bear on a shelf is sadly not a new low, but instead a fairly comfortable old one. “I need to use next Wednesday a little better than this.”

 

Thankfully, there's no response from Kukalaka, and Julian goes to get a shower before tackling his reading.

 

****

 

 

Garak doesn’t see Julian again for a few days. Some of that is self-preservation. It wouldn’t do to go chasing after this poor man as a smiling reminder that there’s a strange decision to make.

 

It’s likely there isn’t a decision to be made at all, if he’s honest with himself. More likely, it’s Julian trying to be kind and buying time to come up with a nice way of saying  _no_. It had been a silly self-dare to even ask Julian to come on a date, and Garak had expected to be politely yet sweetly denied and then able to carry on with his shop, tend to his duties, and not be distracted with ridiculous crushes or the haunting nag of ‘ _what if?’_  following after him every time he smelled pizza.

 

His own actions nag him now. While he sits behind a sewing machine or rips out a seam, Garak analyzes every gesture and every glance between himself and Julian and he wonders how he could ever have let himself be so  _obvious_. How could he have let someone see him so transparently fond and how long had he been so out of practice? He’d even indulged an old habit and taken Julian’s hand and  _Really, Elim? How old are you?_

 

How old, indeed. How much too old to be pursuing or even interested in anything with Julian at all? Julian is certainly young, but exactly how young, Garak doesn’t know. He could find out, certainly, but maybe it can wait. Until later. Until it really needs to be known. If it ever even gets the chance to become an issue.

 

Yes.

But if Julian  _did_ say he’d go out again? There’s an art gallery a few blocks away, there’s a beautiful old theater that hosts stage plays of all kinds, there’s a music hall… He wasn’t even certain Julian liked these things, but hearing what he had to say about them would be wonderful. Would Julian find an ancient play dull? Would he go to an opera? What’s playing at the theater? How soon is too soon for another evening out? How long has it been since he’s contemplated anything like this? How  _ridiculous_  is all this?

 

It’s easy to get caught up in obsessive details when he’s buried in the basement. Small spaces only get smaller when you have nothing to do but wonder or worry over details. Hems distract and sequins frustrate and the color choices for this customer's wedding are atrocious and it would all be better with chocolate.

 

He stands in the kitchen and considers how badly he really wants to fight with pulling a chair over so he can retrieve his hidden chocolate from the cabinets above the stove when he hears someone talking quite loudly in the laundry room.

 

He hadn’t planned to move in next to one of the finest information hubs in the building, but his apartment just happened to be situated just down the hall from the shared laundry area for part of the building and few people, save for pizza shop employees, gossip like bored folks doing laundry. The location has proved useful on numerous occasions, provided amusement while preparing meals, and let Garak in on secrets and drama that no one was meant to overhear. It isn’t his fault that so many people overlook his door on their way through the halls, or that none of them seem to realize that the echoes there carry through the ventilation system. Today, the loud gossip is courtesy of Mister Miles O’Brien, the universal handy man who has somehow made friends with Julian, but who very importantly did  _not_  discuss subtitled films.

 

“I’ll see what I can do.” O’Brien’s voice echoes in the laundry room and travels just audibly into the ducts in Garak’s apartment. “This isn’t supposed to take long, but you never know what some people will put in the wash. … Right. Hey, is Molly around?”

 

On the phone while fixing the notorious flooding washing machine. The conversation is bound to be mundane, but Garak leans against the wall and waits to hear more. If Julian likes this man, there might be something worth discovering here.

 

“Oh, right, I completely forgot about that. But that’s good, because I wanted to tell you about Julian. … Yeah, and how I said he was doing something with that shady guy?”

 

Garak frowns and glares at the vent.

 

“Uh-huh. Well, I talked to that guy who’s always at Quark’s today, and - …No, not him. You probably don’t know him. But it doesn’t matter, he’s just this guy who is  _always_ in there, and he told me he saw Julian take one of the Dabo girls home with him the other night. … I don’t know. … Right, right. … No, he hasn’t, but I- … I won’t! I just thought you might like to know! I mean it’s a creepy guy probably older than I am, or an anonymous Dabo girl, you know? I'm sure he is, he's not dumb. … Well then we’ll tell Quark he should invest in some Dabo  _boys_ , too!”

 

O’Brien’s laughter practically seeps into the kitchen and Garak pulls away from the wall lest it seep into him too. Nothing about this should surprise him, and it definitely should not  _sting_. No one would have expected anything else. Young man takes home young woman, definitely not older man. And one date certainly doesn't mean anything significant, no matter who you are.

 

He’d been trying not to let himself get too excited, not to be too positive, but he’d managed somehow in trying not to get his hopes  _up_  to still  _have hopes_. Julian liked Garak, enough to go on one date, and that had apparently been strong enough to poke holes through all of Garak’s rational adult expectations. Suddenly the chocolate sounds not only good, but positively necessary.

 

 

****

 

 

When Garak does see Julian again, it’s Saturday afternoon and the little pizza shop is practically vibrating with activity. It seemed Saturday would be a good time to let Julian off the hook; he would be so busy cleaning tables that he wouldn’t have to think about the situation at all and then maybe Garak could hope that they’d still be able to talk about an occasional _something_ once the awkward died down. Julian is there balancing a giant tray of empty cups and plates on each arm while the owner's young son follows behind him with a bin of utensils. They're both in Deep Dish Nine's hideous over-saturated red polo shirts, though the color looks far better on the boy than it does Julian. Garak had hoped to get Julian's attention when the door jingled on his way in. Unfortunately, Julian ducks into the back with the trays the moment he and Garak make eye contact.

 

_Is he afraid that I already know his answer, or to give it to me?_

 

Either way, it may be difficult to even talk to Julian today.

 

“Hi, how many?” The owner's son Jake stands in front of him, grinning.

 

“Just me, thank you.”

 

Jake finds Garak a small table near the register and hands him a menu. In general, Garak prefers seats close to the door, just in case, but today he’s willing to sit here. It may even be advantageous to be close to the front register.

 

“Anything to drink?”

 

“A glass of water, please.”

 

“Okay, glass of water, coming up!”

 

The young man walks off, weaving in and out of the waiting customers and apparently in the habit of narrating his own actions if his muttering is any indication. Garak makes a decent show of looking through the menu, even though he rarely bothers to order anything but a salad that includes a few vegetables native to Cardassia.

 

The manager's son returns with Garak's water and cheerfully produces a notepad. It seems to be covered in paragraphs rather than customer requests. “Are you ready to order?”

 

“I think I'll need just a few more minutes.”

 

“Sure, take your time! I'll be back in a little bit to check on you!” As he wanders away, Garak is sure he hears something like, ' _Captain Sisko doesn't know what to make of this alien..._ '

 

Garak is about to consider having his meal to go and abandoning this silly attempt at a non-conversation when he notices Julian emerging from the kitchen out of the corner of his eye. He’s removed his nametag, and Garak pretends to be completely absorbed in the menu when Julian stands behind the chair across from him. As much as he wants to talk, if he looks too eager, this could only be worse.

 

“Hello, Garak.” Julian's voice is just barely loud enough to carry over the sound of the other customers.

 

Garak looks up and feigns surprise. “Oh, hello. Have  _you_  come to take my order instead?” Pleasant smile, like the one for customers.

 

Julian frowns a little. “No, I’m on break. I just came to talk to you for a minute.”

 

Garak motions to the chair in front of Julian. “Do sit down.”

 

“I really shouldn’t, I…” He shifts his weight back and forth a few times, apparently a mess of nerves. “I don’t want to be late going back like last time.”

 

It’s difficult to tell if Julian wants to say something on his own or if he wants it pulled out of him, but Garak reasons that this will be easier on them both if he just brings it up. He keeps his voice light and conversational, like the ladies chatting in his shop. “I heard from Mister O'Brien that you had a nice time with one of the young ladies from Quark's the other night.”

 

Julian suddenly shifts out of awkward and sounds a little angry. “Since when do you talk to _Miles_?”

 

“I don’t. I only heard.”

 

Julian grips the back of the chair in front of him, like he's straining to keep himself contained and upright. “Well, okay, listen – I'm sorry. He shouldn't have said anything to you, and I'll--”

 

 _Of course_  Julian tries to apologize. It's sweet, but it's like he  _wants_  to drag this out. Garak shakes his head. “You don't need to apologize. I'm glad you found someone more suited to your tastes.” He’s a bit bitterer than he thought, however, and adds, “Though, I wish you'd given me the courtesy you promised me and let me know either way.”

 

Julian frowns. “I completely intend to give you that courtesy. Anything I may or may not have done with Leeta has nothing to do with us.”

 

There's a very unbecoming sort of flutter in Garak's ribs over ' _us_ '. He's never heard of anyone getting so old that they circle around and become pathetically young again, but it's possible he has somehow managed to be the first.

 

Garak bows his head. “I apologize. I assumed…”

 

“Well, don’t do that, then!” Julian leans forward over the chair, and braces himself with one hand on the table. “Of all people to make assumptions, Garak,  _you_?”

 

“A fault, for which I am sorry. Happens to the best of us.” It’s actually rather flattering that Julian thinks Garak to be above assuming. Frankly, he  _should_  be above that, but he’s been slipping lately. He's out of practice and Julian’s made him a little weak, despite how bold he’d had to be to ask for a date in the first place.

 

Julian smiles and, perhaps, forgives. “Maybe I  _can_  sit down, just for a bit.” He takes a seat in the chair and slides in so close to the table that it’s pressing into his torso. He looks oddly sheepish for having just been angry (and right!), and doesn’t make constant eye contact, but he’s apparently willing to talk. Perhaps an attempt to take more blame...?

 

“You needn’t say anything to Mister O’Brien,” Garak says. “The fault lies entirely with me.”

 

Julian frowns, and considers. “But you said he said something to you?”

 

“Not to me, no.”

 

“Then who  _did_  he say something to?”

 

“Mrs. O’Brien, I should think.”

 

Julian appears even more lost. “You talk to  _Keiko_?”

 

Maybe it’s a little silly to be concealing something like this, especially when Julian’s been so kind to talk in the first place. “I overheard him talking on the telephone while fixing one of the machines in the laundry room. From what I hear, it’s been known to leak.”

 

“Were you  _spying_  on Miles?”

 

“Not at all. The sound from that room carries directly into my kitchen. Did you know the Bajoran couple on the third floor are getting a divorce?”

 

Julian’s eyes go wide. “No! Always thought they looked so happy. When did that happen?”

 

“When she turned out to be pregnant, rather than just carrying a little extra weight.”

 

“Wouldn’t –  _Oh_. Not his, is it?”

 

“No.”

 

“Then whose is --?” Suddenly, Julian stops and shakes his head. “Ugh, now  _you’ve_  got me doing it. Jadzia had me talking the other day about Odo being some kind of voyeur.”

 

Garak grins. “Is he?”

 

Julian squeezes his eyes shut and holds up his hands. “I have absolutely  _no idea_ , and I want to keep it that way.”

 

“Well, if you ever change your mind about information, you’re invited to my kitchen.”

 

Julian smiles and folds his arms on the table against his chest. “You really think I’m going to stand around in your kitchen listening to people gossip in the laundry room?”

 

A charming smile couldn't hurt, surely. “No, but perhaps you’d stay long enough for a meal?”

 

“I think you’re getting a little too non-linear again,” Julian teases. “Next thing I know, I tell you I’ll go out again, and we’ll meet your family.”

 

“Quite impossible, since they’re in Cardassia.”

 

“That’s not --” But Julian doesn’t finish, he just shakes his head, laughs, and pushes himself away from the table. “Sure, of course.” He stands up, dusts off his knee, and reaches into his pocket. He pulls out his nametag and a little pad of paper.

 

“No one’s been over here to get an order for you, right?”

 

Garak blinks. He'd nearly forgotten about lunch. “Oh. No. No, not yet.”

 

Julian’s pen is poised on the notepad. “Okay, what will you have? Salad again? With the funny leaves no one else eats? Dressing on the side?”

 

Garak nods, and can’t help but smile. “That would be lovely, thank you.”

 

Julian strides off into the back and Garak hears him call out the order for the salad. Deep Dish Nine’s owner, Mister Sisko, laughs. “Is that Mister Garak’s order again, Julian?”

 

“Yes, sir! Bit predictable, isn’t he?”

 

“Just as much as you delivering it!”

 

As much as he wants to get himself all ruffled over ‘predictable’, Garak can’t bring himself to care. Something about Julian knowing Garak's preferred salad, and Mister Sisko knowing it's for Garak if it comes from Julian is wonderful, and fully worth 'predictable.'

 

However, the restaurant is far busier than he likes, and, distracted by Julian, he hadn’t thought to ask for the salad to go. He could go home and eat with relative silence and not have anyone looming over him or closing in on him. When Julian brings the salad out to him, though, Garak is more than content to stay. Julian can’t stay to chat - there are tables to be wiped down and other people to feed - but Garak has had enough pleasantness in his lunch so far that the crowd doesn’t bother him for a change.

 

And when he finishes, it’s Jake who clears away his plate and takes his card for payment, but _Julian_  who dodges a line of people ordering at the register to bring Garak his receipt.

 

Julian flattens two of them to the table and hands Garak a pen. “Here, we just need you to sign the one copy, and you get to keep the other.”

 

Garak happily signs, but waves both receipts away. “Oh, I don’t need a copy, thank you.”

 

Julian is insistent, however and slides the extra copy across the table, nearly under Garak's fingers. “You should just take this one.”

 

Garak is not a dumb man, and he knows a hint when he sees it. “As you like. Thank you.”

 

“I’ll see you later, okay?” Julian’s gaze flicks to the receipt and his lip twitches as though he’s stopped himself from biting it.

 

“Of course.” Garak nods, and as soon as Julian is out of sight in the kitchen, he looks at the receipt. Nothing unusual on the front, but on the back is a scrawled phone number and underneath, in that same scrawl:

 

_I’m free on Wednesday._

 


	7. Price

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julian gets a phone call, agrees to a date at a theater, changes number of said date, and is charmingly bad at most things dates involve. Garak is amused by all of it.

 

 

“You gave him your _phone number_?’’

 

“It just seemed like the most logical thing to do.”

 

Miles' disapproval is only enhanced by the static on the headset. “I need to get you a Vulcan friend. The most _logical_ thing would have been never speaking to him again, not -- Oh, heal me.”

 

“Got it, got it.” Julian flashes through a series of quick finger movements over the controller and Miles’ character on the screen begins to sparkle. “And I like talking to him. I’m not stopping because _you_ think he’s weird.”

 

“Thanks.” Miles' barbarian goes back to repetitively slamming into the enemy. “So, you don’t think he’s even the _slightest_ bit off? Not in some deep dark place in the back of your brain? No little voice saying, ‘ _Juliaaaan, he’s going to eat you aliiive…’_?”

 

“I didn’t say I don’t think he’s _different_ , I just don’t think he’s _up to anything_.” Julian's character begins casting yet another spell to enhance the power of weapons.

 

“Asking kids out on dates isn’t up to something?”

 

“I’m not a kid.” _I'm just sitting cross-legged on the floor playing video games._ “Say that one more time and see if I heal you again.”

 

“That isn’t fair! My barbarian didn’t do anything to you!”

 

“Unfortunately, my cleric disagrees about the level of separation between our realm and his.”

 

“Your cleric is a jerk.”

 

“Tragic, isn’t it? I think it might be terminal.”

 

Miles's character begins flashing red. “Speaking of dying--”

 

“I’ve got it. _This time_.” Julians sighs as he heals Miles' character yet again. The enemy is still stubbornly existing, and a quick check to his health shows that Miles' weapon is not doing nearly enough damage in each turn for this battle to be worth the investment of time, energy, or magic. “This guy is weak against ‘holy’, do you have any ‘holy’ weapons?”

 

“Only if you mean ‘ _holy_ _shit_ _, that’s a big hammer_.’ I can’t equip ‘holy’ stuff.”

 

“Why not? Isn’t your character human?”

 

“Yeah, but I’m wearing cursed armor. Cursed armor means you can’t use ‘holy,' and I can’t afford to get the curse removed.”

 

“Is _that_ why I have to heal you all the time? Does it sap your HP like the last one?”

 

“Guess so.”

 

“Miles! You're just wasting my magic!”

 

“We'll get it, it's almost dead!” Clearly Miles is trying to avoid the accusation.

 

“When was the last time you sharpened your weapons?”

 

There's an uncomfortable silence over the headset. “... I have to sharpen them?”

 

“MILES!”

 

“Don't scream at me! Can't you just do it? Is there a spell for that?”

 

“I'm a cleric, not a blacksmith!”

 

***

 

If it was illogical of Julian to give Garak his phone number, it was far more illogical to be worrying about it once it was done. However, this didn't stop Julian from an endless preoccupation with his phone and all things related. _When will he call, if he calls at all?_ Will he call while Julian is in class? While he’s sleeping? While he’s working? _Any_ time when Julian isn’t prepared to take a call? _What will he even want to suggest?_

 

Julian goes through his daily life feeling and hearing phantom phone calls. Is that a phone vibrating in his pocket? No, it's an itch. Is that ringing? No, it's the headphones on the kid behind him in a study hall. Every time his jeans rub his hip, he checks his phone. Every far off song on the radio of a passing car sounds just like his ring tone.

 

Two days of scrambling for his phone at the slightest provocation end when Julian is at home compiling material for a lengthy research paper.

 

The phone rings and Julian’s heart nearly bursts through his ribs.

 

 _It’s him, it's him, what do I do?_ Julian tosses the phone back and forth between his hands as though it's hot until he steadies himself. _Answer the phone, you idiot, it's what you've been trying to do for three days._

 

The screen says the number is ‘ _Unavailable_.’ This is either a telemarketer, or Garak. Julian takes a breath and accepts the call.

 

“Hello?”

 

“So it really _is_ your number. I wondered if I wouldn’t be calling a meat counter or paying a flat rate per minute.”

 

Julian’s stomach twists and rearranges itself and yet, somehow, this makes him smile. “Hello, Garak.”

 

“Hello, Julian.” Julian can almost see the shallow acknowledging nod when Garak says hello, and there’s a quality to Garak’s voice that makes the skin on Julian’s neck tingle. Controlled politeness is there, yes, but also an implied familiarity that is only magnified when Garak’s voice is sitting right in Julian’s ear. “I trust you’re doing well?”

 

“Yes? I suppose so.” Telephone small talk is even less Julian’s strong point than the face-to-face kind. Surely Garak wasn’t a small talk sort of man when not serving a customer?

 

“Glad to hear it. I’m calling about Wednesday. If you’re still free, of course.” Julian is quite relieved this is about another date with Garak and not the weather. A moment later he considers how very odd that feeling is.

 

“I am. Do you … want to do something?”

 

“That _is_ why I’m calling.”

 

Julian drops his head into his palm. “Right. I meant, ‘Do you have something in mind?’”

 

“Well, that depends.”

 

Julian sits up and wraps his fist around part of his t-shirt. “On what?”

 

“On what number this would be.”

 

Truthfully, Julian had thought extensively about this while serving pizzas and sorting studies and surveys for class. Date number two was already done, and they couldn’t very well do number one because it had to be awkward. Three Garak would likely find disappointingly linear, and Julian decided five or six would mean he would need to be prepared for a kiss or the content of the date itself to lean a little more on the candlelight side.

 

Julian tries to sound like he hasn’t debated it for days. “Four, I think.”

 

“ _Fantastic_. Do you like theater?”

 

“I think so?”

 

Garak laughs. “You don’t sound certain. We could try something else.”

 

Julian releases his shirt and flails his hand as though Garak is sitting in front of him. “Oh, no, no! Nothing like that! It sounds great, yes, fine! I’ll go! I just… haven’t seen much.” Julian slowly drops his head onto the arm of the sofa, closes his eyes, and tries to will himself to stop sounding like an idiot. “I… liked what little I’ve seen.”

 

There’s no laughter in the phone, but Garak’s smirk carries even though his voice. “You haven’t even heard what we’d be seeing.”

 

Julian rolls onto his back and works his feet in between the sofa cushions. “Is this one going to blind me as well?”

 

“It shouldn’t.”

 

“Any other warnings apply? Is there a splash zone? What language is it in?”

 

“You’ll be able to understand it, don’t worry.” Garak's laugh comes through in his voice. It's unbelievably satisfying to make him laugh, even a little.

 

“What is it about?” Julian reaches to the floor and grabs a handful of anatomy flash cards. He presses the phone between his shoulder and his cheek and holds the cards up above his head. He can’t write an essay on the phone, but he can at least leaf through a collection of muscles.

 

“It’s a very old Cardassian story about a death.”

 

Julian blinks in surprise and lets his hands fall to his stomach. “ _Death?_ ”

 

“Will that be a problem?” Garak’s tone is quite innocent.

 

“No, but-” Julian's flash cards are abandoned as quickly as they were adopted. “Do Cardassians have a different idea of ‘date material’ than we do?”

 

“How many Cardassians do you know?”

 

“I… see Dukat occasionally. But you’re the only one I guess I _know._ ”

 

“Perhaps, then, you ought to consider that it’s just _me_.”

 

Julian bites his lip. There is remarkably little to go on from Garak’s voice alone and it’s amazing how much of him Julian is realizing is expressed only through gesture. “Sorry, that was – I seem to get that backwards all the time. One thing is Cardassian and I think it's you, and then something is you and I think - well. I just thought ' _a death_ ' sounded awfully… dark.”

 

“I thought you'd like something a bit beyond the typical, but, if you’d prefer something more traditionally romantic…”

 

Garak’s tone makes it sound like he is expecting Julian to flail madly into the phone, objecting with, _‘No, no! Death is fine!’_ , and in a complete panic. There’s risk that the date will become far more like number six if Julian wants to surprise Garak with his response, but at the moment, maybe he’s more curious than apprehensive.

 

“That would be fine.” Casual. Natural.

 

The silence that lingers for a whole four seconds is not insignificant, or to be taken lightly. This is _Garak._ Julian is really quite pleased with himself.

 

“I’ll... take that into consideration,” Garak finally replies. “Can I assume you'd still be willing to see _this_ show, come death or romance?”

 

Julian laughs. “I can handle it. I'm just going to start thinking you're strange if the next thing we go to is about cannibalism or requires animal sacrifice at the door.”

 

“You don't think I'm strange already? I clearly haven't been trying hard enough.”

 

“Definitely not. You’ve only just begun to register as ‘ _slightly odd_.’” It’s ridiculous how fun this is. Ridiculous how Julian delights in making Garak laugh as much as he delights in laughing. This is why they keep talking, this is why Julian keeps agreeing to dates – Garak is brilliant, and Garak is _fun._

 

“How fortunate for me that you don’t seem to mind ‘slightly odd,’ then.”

 

“I suppose I don’t.” It’s as much an answer as it is a moment of realization. Julian wishes he could see some kind of reaction – a smile, a nod, even a _blink._

 

Garak _sounds_ pleased anyway. “What time do you have free?”

 

“Oh, um, after five-thirty?”

 

“Perfect; the show begins at six-thirty. Can I take you to dinner as well?”

 

Julian looks around his bare apartment, where there are practically dotted lines on the walls asking to be filled with things he can't afford. “I think I can suffer through someone buying me dinner, yes.” He catches sight of his lone pair of dress shoes (worn to a friend’s wedding some year or two ago) still sitting by the door and inhales through his teeth. “Is there any kind of dress code?”

 

“If you could avoid the jeans with the hole in the knee, that would be preferred.”

 

“I guess the space station shirt is out of the question too, then.”

 

“Afraid so. Think of it as not formal, but also not Quark’s.”

 

Julian's memory of owning anything but t-shirts is fuzzy.“I probably have something that buttons up the front in the back of my closet.”

 

“Please promise me you’ll iron it.”

 

“I’ll… borrow an iron from someone.”

 

Again, Garak’s smirk is actually audible. “You can stop by the shop if you need.”

 

“Thanks,” Julian says sheepishly. “I'll check with Miles and Keiko first, but if not, I'll be paying you a visit.”

 

“Lovely. Then I’ll let you get back to your work, and I’ll see you Wednesday evening.”

 

“Sure, okay, yes. I’ll see you then.”

 

The room feels strangely empty without Garak on the phone. Kukalaka can't speak, but he's a remarkable listener. Julian cranes his neck to look at his bear tucked away among reference texts on the shelf. He'd have to ask a psych student if it was more or less healthy to talk to the bear rather than just himself.

 

“I told him it would be okay if this was romantic. Maybe it’s number six after all.” He braces his chin on the back of the couch, almost frowning at the shelf where Kukalaka sits.

 

It’s odd how seriously he’s taking this non-linear thing, how willing he is to act as if he _is_ on a second or fourth date when his nerves really went on a first and are preparing for a second. Part of him thinks it’s because he’ll always be able to backtrack to one or three, but another part enjoys just as much that he can jump way ahead and test the waters and if he doesn’t like the temperature, he can swim back and say it was in the spirit of non-linear and not terror or disgust.

 

“He isn’t disgusting, though, is he? He’s intriguing and – contrary to what I told him – absolutely _strange_ , but not really terrifying or disgusting.”

 

He slumps into his couch cushions, letting his thoughts sink in just as unevenly as he fits in the cushions. “And now I have to tell Miles I want an iron. For a date with Garak. Maybe I can just ask Keiko when Miles isn't ho – _shit,_ I told him I didn't have _an iron_ , am I _fourteen_?”

 

 

****

 

 

 

Julian's dress shirt is not wrinkled, thankfully, but it's definitely old. When Julian fishes it out of his dusty closet Wednesday morning, he realizes he needs a new shirt quite badly, but has neither time nor money for it. So, sleeves a bit off, he goes to meet Garak that evening after class and hopes that he won't offend Garak's tastes too egregiously.

 

The night is cool, but thankfully not _cold_ yet and Garak is already waiting outside of the shop. He appears very properly dressed, even from a block away, and is staring at the sky, hands deep in the pockets of his long dark grey coat. Either he doesn't hear Julian approach, or he pretends not to.

 

Four feet from Garak, and not a word, or a smile, or even an acknowledging nod from him. Julian can see nothing in the sky worth this much attention, but stares up anyway. A passing plane blinks a regular red light across the sky and in the distance, there's a flashing radio tower. There are few clouds, and a bright almost-full moon, but there are really fairly few stars. The apartments aren't located in the heart of a city, but there's enough light pollution that most of the stars are invisible anyway.

 

Garak is utterly still, and Julian can't be completely certain he's breathing. There's no wistful sighing or disappointed harrumphing or any kind of reaction. It's just Garak watching the few bright specks the sky has to offer city people.

 

“You can see these same stars in Cardassia,” he says suddenly. There's no change in his posture. “Isn't it remarkable that the stars would follow me even out here? Of course, I used to see more there.”

 

Julian laughs, just a bit, and folds his arms over his chest. It feels colder when he's not moving. “Hello, Garak.”

 

“Hello, Julian.” Finally looking at him and not locked onto the sky, Garak is smiling.

 

“Shame about the stars.”

 

“It's perhaps appropriate that I can't see them all.”

 

“What, tailors can't look at stars?”

 

Garak shakes his head. “Nothing like that. Only that I find the sky a suitable mirror. What I see of Cardassia while I live here is the watered down remains of Cardassia Heights and a sad apartment building next to a transportation system that could take me anywhere I wanted to go except my own home. In the sky, I'm denied looking at real stars, and also the ability to visit the worlds I _can_ see.”

 

“Oh. Right. Planets. Of course.” Julian's gaze drifts up to the few twinkling lights in the sky. There are some real stars up there, though their numbers are so few they can be counted. The brightest ones command the most attention and they're not even what most people think they are. Julian had always found them rather soothing, and in fact often forgot that they were planets and not stars, but now Garak has him feeling just the tiniest bit resentful that they can't visit them.

 

“Well.” Garak turns toward Julian, and his thoughtful demeanor changes completely. “Are you ready to go?”

 

Julian tightens his arms across his chest. “Uh, yes, but, before we go, I have something I need to show you.”

 

Garak's eyes widen and he leans slightly closer. “Oh?”

 

Julian shrugs his jacket from his shoulders and pulls out one arm. True to form, Garak knows what is wrong before Julian is even completely out and his bright interest is replaced with pained sympathy.

 

“Oh, I wish you'd let me see this before now.”

 

Julian winces. “Sorry, it's the only one I have.”

 

Garak reaches toward Julian's exposed wrist, and gets close, but does not touch it. It's like he's desperate to save a lost cause. “If I'd known, I'd have given you a shirt that fit.”

 

“Garak, I couldn't just _take_ a shirt from you.”

 

“You'd just be _borrowing_ it. It's just such a shame... Do you want to try rolling the sleeves up when we get there?”

 

Julian wants to frown and laugh at the same time. “Um, okay, but isn't that _less_ formal than too short?”

 

“It would be,” Garak agrees, “but you'd look casual rather than just ill-fitting and one of those is much worse than the other.”

 

“Whatever you say.”

 

“Not interested in defending your wardrobe today? You've been so confident about your t-shirts. I'm a bit disappointed!” He grasps his own wrists, and his hands disappear into his coat.

 

Julian shrugs. “Sorry. I'm a bit nervous, to be honest.”

 

Garak's mouth opens, just a bit, and as he tilts his head, he looks sincerely worried. “What in the world for?”

 

There are just not enough acceptable things to do with one's arms when searching for something to do other than stand dumbly in front of someone. “Well, I _did_ say this could be a bit more romantic...”

 

“It's not an obligation. I won't pressure you.” Garak's concern and his sincerity are both rather sweet and he looks so worried that Julian feels like he has to try to joke the whole thing away.

 

“Oh, well, good! I'm not sure what I'd do if you had a gift or wanted to hold hands the whole way there or...” Julian trails off when there's a brief twitch in Garak's expression and he suddenly feels that this was entirely the wrong thing to say. “I've... just made an ass out of myself, haven't I?”

 

Garak recovers quickly and shakes his head. “No, not at all.”

 

Julian is not convinced. “I'm sorry. Please just forget I said anything.”

 

“Which part?” Garak asks. He smiles, of course, but Julian can't quite tell what _kind_ of smile this is. “Am I forgetting the part in which you don't want a gift, or the part in which it was fine if things were romantic?”

 

Julian winces. He shakes his head and holds his hands up as a gesture of 'stop'. “No, okay, just – listen, let's just start over. I told you this was number four, and that it was okay if something was a little romantic. So that’s what it is. It's all okay.”

 

Garak nods in response and he's smiling, yes, but his smile is still the same. It's a polite smile. It's for Julian's benefit only, and it's not real.

 

“That goes for the gift thing, too,” Julian adds. “Small gifts are pretty reasonable with four dates, right? So I'm going on record as officially perfectly happy to accept anything you'd want to give me as long as it didn't mean we were instantly married.”

 

Garak lets out a restrained laugh. “You seem awfully concerned that you'll accidentally marry me at every turn.”

 

Julian groans. “I should just stop talking at all.”

 

“That would be a terrible shame, I hope you reconsider.”

 

This is a rare sentiment. It's why Julian even likes Garak, and a large part of why he's agreed to any of these outings. Garak actually _likes_ hearing Julian babble about the things he finds interesting, or the things he doesn’t find interesting, or just things in general. In this situation, Miles would be pretending to celebrate that Julian even considered not talking at all. It’s all in good fun, but when even your best friend thinks you talk too much, and your coworkers smile and nod rather than engage in a conversation… someone like Garak is an incredibly welcome change.

 

“For you, I’ll think about it.” This feels a bit foolish, standing in the cold outside of a tailor shop and grinning at each other under street lights. Julian rubs his arms. “Should we get moving?”

 

“Yes, but first, if it won’t upset you, I _did_ bring you something…”

 

Julian flails his hands a bit. “No, no, you won’t upset me! It’s fine!” He calms himself, and his voice. “But you didn’t have to bring me anything.”

 

“I wanted to. I thought it might be appropriate.” Garak pulls a soft-looking bundle wrapped in elaborately folded tissue paper out of his coat. There’s even a ribbon holding the thing together.

 

 _Garak_ _ would _ _do flawless giftwrapping._

 

Garak offers the package almost tentatively, and Julian does his best to accept it with some shred of grace. It’s a ridiculous pantomime trying to get this right – too eager and he’ll look greedy, too casual or slowly and he’ll look ungrateful or disinterested. Other people seem to know the exact balance, but Julian isn’t ever sure he’s doing it properly. The package sits in his hands for a moment before Julian has to admit that he doesn’t know the next part of this particular ritual.

 

“Do you… want me to open it now, or am I supposed to wait until I get home?”

 

“Whichever makes you more comfortable.” Garak glances at the package sitting in Julian’s hands. “Though I would like to see if you like it, and it might be of more use to you right now.”

 

“I’ll open it, then.” He’s never been good at accepting gifts; the reaction always feels too forced or not the level of joy the giver was hoping for. Everyone else’s level of enthusiasm when receiving a present always seems perfect, but even when he sincerely enjoys what he’s been given, Julian's own reaction is never enough, or too over the top, and is just never right.

 

He’s careful not to tear the paper and picks gently at the tape and the ribbon.

 

Garak laughs. It's almost nothing more than a puff of air. “It’s okay, you can tear it. That’s part of the fun, isn’t it?”

 

Julian returns the laugh. “It just looks nice! I didn’t want to ruin it.” Thanks to his nerves, he tries to gesture to the present and hold it at the same time. The package nearly falls from his hands.

 

“Careful.”

 

“God, sorry. Just a second.”

 

He’s almost through removing it without tearing a thing, and so finishes the way he started, with Garak standing amused in front of him. When the paper slides away, some incredibly soft blue striped fabric falls into Julian’s hands and nearly unfolds itself to the ground. Garak catches the end of it, and seems to be in a bit of a rush to explain. Julian is thankful he's not the only one feeling a bit twitchy.

 

“It got cold the last time we out, and from what I saw of you in your sweatshirt this past week, I thought you could at least use a scarf if you were going to refuse to wear a real coat.”

 

He wants to frown or defend his clothing choices yet again, or even make a joke about Garak being his mother, but suddenly, Julian has no trouble at all feeling for the proper or socially appropriate response and it's a bit of a thrill. He doesn’t even have to manufacture the reaction that he expects Garak will want because he sincerely _feels_ , “Thank you.”

 

“You’re very welcome. I hoped it would meet with your approval.” Garak folds the end of scarf that he saved from the ground back into Julian’s hands. It's still amazing how soft it is.

 

Julian is about to throw it over his head when he stops, scarf up in the air and head ducked down. “Should I wear it now, or would it be an affront to fashion to wear it with a dress shirt?”

 

“The affront to fashion is the length of your sleeves. The scarf should be lovely.” Garak’s smile is ridiculously fond and Julian almost feels triumphant to have earned it somehow.

 

The scarf is fantastically soft against Julian's jaw and wonderfully warm, though Garak’s expression says it is not quite as nice looking as it feels.

 

“Is it… do you need to fix it?” Julian offers.

 

There's no verbal answer, just action. Julian is very conscious of the weight of Garak’s hands while he’s fixing the front of the scarf, far more than he would be were anyone else doing this. Julian might _listen_ to Miles if he said the scarf looked funny, but he'd never let Miles _fix it_. This is Garak, and this is really a very close ritual when really considered and the only other people he could want doing this are named Dax.

 

A brush of Garak's knuckle and Julian thinks of the collarbone gesture, of one-sided declarations of fondness, of picturing Garak with a fork against Julian’s neck. Julian knows trust is involved in that gesture, but not as much as he wishes he knew.

 

_I hope I didn’t just use a scarf to offer something more than I’m prepared to give._

 

Garak steps back, and his very _present_ hands vanish back into his coat. He's clearly pleased with the new state of Julian’s scarf. “There, much better.”

 

“It looks okay?”

 

“It’s lovely. I thought it would be a good match for your color. I’m glad I was right.” He looks so pleased with himself over something as trivial as a scarf that it’s really kind of charmingly funny.

 

_Though maybe it isn’t trivial._

 

“Shall we go?” Garak turns and holds his arm – bent at the elbow – out to Julian.

 

 _Oh. Right, okay._ Julian nods and bends his arm in much the same way, trying to imagine how it it will hook around comfortably. He shifts his weight onto one foot toward Garak, but can't seem to make heads or tails of the whole thing.

 

Garak thankfully does not look or sound offended. “May I?” Julian bites his lip and nods. Garak reaches out with his other hand, and places Julian's hand in the appropriate place – wrapped around the inside of Garak's elbow.

 

_Romantic. Okay._

 

Julian stares at his own hand for several seconds until he can feel Garak looking at him. He nearly jumps when he meets Garak's eyes. “Oh! Sorry, I – this is going to sound stupid, but I always thought this looked more complicated on television.”

 

Garak laughs quite a bit more loudly than Julian has ever heard before.

 

****

 

 

It's not exactly a surprise that Garak leads them to another Cardassian building. Julian isn't sure he could sit a person down – say, Jake Sisko – and describe exactly what, specifically, Cardassian architecture looks like, but he knows it whenever he sees it. It's far more _severe_ then the Bajoran buildings that make up the the buildings surrounding Deep Dish Nine's block.

 

Julian leans in close as he and Garak make their way through a small but talkative and loud crowd outside the theater itself. “Do you just set these up the night before we go somewhere?”

 

“Pardon?”

 

“This is two times we’ve been out, and three Cardassian places we’ve been to! How many _are_ there?”

 

Garak tilts his head. “You will recall that this area was once part of Cardassia Heights. This shouldn’t surprise you.”

 

“The part that surprises me is that they’re still here! I mean, if I were Bajoran – and I mean no offense by this – I’d have these places demolished.”

 

“Then we’re both lucky that you aren’t Bajoran and that Bajorans know when a place is both beautiful and functional.” Garak sounds a bit cold.

 

“Oh, come on Garak. I _appreciate_ them! I’d just want to knock down any reminder of people that had caused me trouble if I were them. I’m _glad_ they’re more restrained than I am.”

 

“Are you?” Still a bit frosty and even though Julian is literally on Garak's arm, he feels suddenly distant.

 

“Yes. The Cardassians are lovely.” It's very sincere, though Garak raises his eyebrows and Julian winces a bit when he realizes how it sounded. “I mean, 'The Cardassians' _buildings_ are lovely.' Though, I'm sure plenty of you are too?” He can't even help that the last part comes out as a question.

 

Garak pauses for a few moments and in those moments his expression is unreadable. Then, he blinks, and it's gone and pleasant Garak who is out on a date returns. “Thank you. I'm sure all of Cardassia will enjoy your appreciation as much as I do.”

 

“You aren't angry, are you?”

 

“No.” He swings a door open with his free arm and nods toward the inside. “Shall we? We don't have long before the start.”

 

“Okay, just a second.”

 

Garak's eyes widen and his posture stiffens when Julian unhooks himself from Garak's elbow. Julian grins as he removes his jacket and makes a deliberate show of rolling up his too-short shirt sleeves. “I didn't want to be an affront to fashion, remember?”

 

“Of course.” The stiffness melts into relaxed immediately.

 

“Unless seeing me peel back clothing is too exciting for you? I can stop.”

 

Garak smirks. “I can conduct myself perfectly well when excited, thank you.”

 

“Have you just implied that my forearms get you excited?”

 

“Have _you_ just implied that that wouldn't bother you?”

 

“I did say romantic, didn't I?”

 

“ _Forearms?”_

 

“I've never seen _yours!_ Maybe that's all it would take, huh?”

 

They enter the main hall and stop briefly at the coat check with Julian back on Garak's arm, both of them laughing, and any discomfort about Bajorans in Cardassian buildings dissipated.

 

It’s odd walking around on someone’s arm, and it would be odd even if Julian were a woman. He can’t seem to get the movement to flow properly. Either he feels like he’s dragging Garak or that he’s being dragged himself. For once it’s not just that he’s with Garak making the situation odd; it's Julian's elbows.

 

Garak, however, does not seem to mind. and if Julian’s honest, he’s glad to have some reason to be attached to someone who knows where he's going. Everything in here is Cardassian: the design, the food, the background music, and the signage. There are arrows on little stands pointing this way and that way and all labeled for the convenience of only a small portion of the people coming to see this show. It's a much larger crowd than Julian expected, and is quite a bit more diverse than he imagined a Cardassian show about a death would attract.

 

“You’re going to have to start teaching me to read all this,” Julian says, leaning in to make himself heard over the crowd. “If I needed a toilet in a hurry in here, I’d be in real trouble.”

 

Garak laughs. It’s arguably the most dignified laugh Julian has ever witnessed and Julian can actually _feel_ it more than he can hear it. “They’re just through there,” Garak says, pointing over the crowd and through a decorated archway. “If you need to go, I can release you.”

 

“How would I even know which one to use?”

 

“You’ll want the one on the left. I’ve been here many times and unless they’ve switched them since last month, you should be fine.”

 

He hadn't needed to go before he brought it up, but it's starting to sound like a good idea. Better now than just when they get settled in seats or while someone is dying dramatically on stage. “I’ll just run over there quickly, okay? Just don’t go too far, I’ll never find you again if you move.”

 

“I’ll be right here.” Garak gives a reassuring nod and just stands serenely in place while Julian makes his way through the crowd. The number of Bajorans here seeing an old Cardassian story is baffling. Sure, they own this area now (or maybe it's again?) but how could they not want to avoid everything that even resembled Cardassians at this point? Are they interested in the culture, or trying to learn how to best retaliate by looking for a weak underbelly?

 

Julian rounds the corner under some impossibly tall arches and just when he sees the door he needs across the room, a Bajoran woman stops in front of him. She looks him up and down and shakes her head.

 

“Well, hello,” she says. There’s a kind of sultry sigh in her voice that is both intriguing and a little unnerving.

 

“Ah, um. Hello there.” It's possibly the most undignified response in history, but at least it fits coming from a man with his sleeves rolled up.

 

 _It's like women can sense when I'm out with Garak and then make themselves more alluring to taunt me._ _Maybe I have ‘Help, I’m being courted by an older man’ written all over me somewhere… Oh my god, maybe it’s the scarf._

 

“This is a real shame,” she says. Her arms are folded over her chest, where a large crystal covered necklace is laying over a long red dress.

 

“Excuse me?”

 

“You must be the daring sort.”

 

“Must I? What are you talking about?”

 

”You came with _him._ ”

 

“I wh – Oh, do you know Garak?” _Maybe this will be fun!_

 

She laughs at his very innocent question, and Julian suspects he’s either missed a joke or become one. “You have no idea whose arm you came in here on, do you?”

 

_She knows something! Be cool._

 

“Maybe I don’t,” Julian admits. “Don’t suppose there’s something you’d like to tell me? Warn me away, maybe?”

 

“You _have_ to know he was involved in the occupation.”

 

Here and there, things about Garak have made Julian suspicious that there was something more serious about him than ‘tailor.’ He was remarkably well-educated, for one thing, and far better with computers than someone his age and without a degree in the field should be. He’d been to an awful lot of places, made references to an awful lot of people and just been far more _something_ than a tailor should be. Despite suspicions though, despite not even _knowing_ Garak’s age or full name or history before the day they met, Julian jumps to Garak’s defense.

 

“Just because he’s _Cardassian_ , doesn’t mean he –“

 

The woman interrupts with loud and mocking laughter. Her necklace tumbles and sparkles across her chest and she covers her mouth in a feigned gesture of propriety.“He came in with the rest of them! Then he's left behind to watch everything that goes on. Don't you know _a spy_ when you see one? Perhaps you ought to take a better background look at your dates!” She glances down at Julian’s toes and lets her gaze drift up until she looks him in the eyes. “Unless he paid for your company, and you’re more interested in cash than your own integrity.”

 

Suddenly, this woman is not even remotely attractive and Julian absolutely boils inside. Elaborate fantasties of hanging this woman from the ceiling by her gaudy necklace flash behind his eyes and he takes a step forward. “Hey! That is _completely_ -!”

 

A soft touch on his elbow stops him.

 

“Miss,” Garak says, stepping between them, “you really ought to refrain from that sort of talk in public. It does you no favors.” He gives her a polite bow along with the smile Julian has seen him use on annoying customers and takes Julian’s hand, gently leading him away. The woman visibly bristles and is about to say something else, but Garak politely stops her with just a gently raised hand. “Now, if you’ll excuse us, we need to find our seats. Enjoy the show, Miss.”

 

Julian is both thrilled to get away from the nasty Bajoran woman and disappointed that she didn’t give him anything but more suspicions. Garak releases Julian’s hand once the woman is out of sight and he makes no effort to resume the arm in arm posture that had clearly amused him so much before.

 

“I apologize,” Garak says. “Usually, people at these sorts of events have a bit more tact.”

 

“Oh, she didn’t bother me,” Julian lies. “She was just saying all these things about _you,_ and --”

 

“And you were defending my honor? How flattering!” It’s a joke, paired with pleasant smile and gentle flirting tone.

 

“Just before you came to defend mine. Can’t say I’ve ever been mistaken for an escort before. She must have a rather funny idea of how not like me they usually look.” He's about to talk about his lack of muscle or perfect shiny hair, even about to make a forearm joke again, when he realizes he's distracting himself. “What were you even doing there? I thought you were going to stay where I could find you again.”

 

Garak presses his palms together in front of him, and bows against them. _A gesture of asking forgiveness? Real or affected?_ “And I _am_ sorry, though I think you'll agree it appears to have worked out in our favor. I saw someone I knew, and when she led me across the room to introduce me to another friend of hers, I thought I should come meet you on your way out so we didn’t lose each other.”

 

Julian nods, but isn’t completely sure he believes Garak’s story. This is mostly because he’s not sure Garak actually _has_ any friends. “I don’t suppose you can tell me why the woman back there thought I was ‘daring’ to show up as your date?”

 

Garak smirks. “Well, aren’t you?”

 

“Maybe for personal reasons, but none that she would know. It's not like she knows Miles.” Julian slides closer as they make their way to a very plush staircase. Their shoulders brush. _Maybe flirting will inspire more answers?_ “She seemed to think it was something in particular about _you…_ ”

 

Garak is not swayed by casual contact. He sighs and looks up at the ornate ceiling. “Perhaps I once made her a dress she didn’t approve of.”

 

Julian frowns. “Garak. She said you were involved in the occupation.”

 

Garak smiles sadly. “We _all_ were, my dear. Cardassia is Cardassians, and Cardassians are Cardassia.”

 

”Garak--”

 

Garak settles a hand on Julian's shoulder. “Would you mind terribly if we put this conversation on hold? Even if I were involved in anything like an occupation, I certainly wouldn’t want to discuss it _here._ ”

 

“Alright.” _I would be frowning much harder right now if you were someone else._

 

“Thank you, my dear.” Garak's hand slides down Julian's back and gently guides him toward the stairs. “After you?”

 

Julian sighs and tries to smile with the conversation with the Bajoran woman sitting in the back of his head. He’s unlikely to get a chance to discuss this again tonight, but he’ll hold onto it for some time when he and Garak aren’t in a big crowd. Though, unless they are someday sitting in Julian’s apartment, he doesn't know when or where that would be…

 


	8. Worth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A story about a death, context (or lack thereof) and dinner.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This particular bit had a bit of force put behind it at the request of tinsnip for her birthday! I am dreadfully, dreadfully late, but this enormous *chunk of stuff* is for her and I hope it is even a little bit what she hoped it'd be! SO sorry, my dear! But look, it exists!

“Here we are! We’re the seats on the end.”

 

“Which one is mine?”

 

“Whichever one you want.”

 

“Oh, um, either's fine.”

 

There’s an awkward but brief shuffle-dance as they silently attempt to decide who is going to sit on which seat. After a few false starts, Garak sighs and then simply decides for them.

 

“Here. I'll take the inside seat. You're taller, you can stretch your legs in the aisle if you need.”

 

“Sure. Okay. Thank you.” _And now I know I'll have full command of at least one armrest._

 

Garak settles in contentedly beside Julian and opens his program. _Oh!_ Julian had almost forgot he was holding his and is excited to see what this could all be about until he unfolds the thing and realizes there is not a single word inside that he can read. He flips to the back cover and compares it to Garak's. The same.

 

He frowns at the little book. “Garak?”

 

“Yes?” Garak doesn’t look up from what Julian can only assume is an enthralling plot summary.

 

“Didn’t you say I was going to understand this?”

 

Garak raises his eyebrows, leans in closer and peers into Julian’s program. “Oh. It seems they’ve given you the wrong one. Presumably because you were with me.” He smiles. _There's no way he didn't plan this._ “Funny. _I_ thought you looked obviously Federation.”

 

Julian sighs and turns the program over, hoping in vain that it will be like the instructions for his DVD player and there will be something he can read on the reverse side. There isn't. He shakes the program at Garak. “What I said earlier? About teaching me this? I meant it. If we’re going to keep this up, I might as well start learning some basics.”

 

Garak is still leaned in close. He looks up from the program with only a flicker of his eyelid. “ _Are_ we going to keep this up?”

 

Julian laughs. “Are you asking me out again already? We’re not even done with _this_ date.”

 

“ _You_ brought it up, my dear.”

 

Julian shrugs. “Fair enough.” Garak looks incredibly smug and Julian finds he'd quite like to shove him. He's even reasonably sure that Garak would take it as playfully as intended. It's odd, all of it. Julian feels comfortable enough to joke with Garak, and even to walk on his arm for a little while, though there’s still, somewhere, some tension about this all turning into something else, something concrete. “Though… can I ask you something about all this?”

 

The smug vanishes and Garak frowns, a sudden cold settling in where flirting had been just moments before. “I hope this isn’t about that woman downstairs.”

 

“No, nothing like that.” Julian waves his hand, brushing the idea away. “I just wondered if there was anything I could do that would make you _not_ want to ask me out again.” _I wonder how invested in this you are, I wonder if you’ve idealized me, I wonder if your default answer to more dates is ‘yes’ no matter what I do, I wonder if Miles is right, I wonder if I’m going to be dragged into the deep end the next time_ _I agree to a date,_ _and I wonder if I even care._

 

“If you don’t want to see me again, you only have to say so. I don’t have to be driven off.” His voice is steady and dignified, though Julian assumes that he's a little offended.

 

“Oh, no, that wasn’t what I meant! I _do_ want to see you, I just wanted to make sure you weren't --” Julian sighs. “Nevermind, okay?”

 

The cold dissipates and Garak looks oddly sympathetic. “Are you still nervous?”

 

And as Garak says it, there’s a jolt of guilt or worry or some ugly combination of the two that shoots from Julian’s ears and straight through his toes. He tries to ignore it, tries play it cool, tries to pretend that he is definitely completely over _nervous._ “About what?”

 

Garak, however, is either not fooled or else is just being Garak. “About whether this will suddenly turn romantic.” He's sitting very 'properly': legs crossed with his hands clasped and pinning his program to one knee. 

 

“God, I don’t know. I think I might just naturally be a complete mess, how about that?” Julian runs his fingers through his hair and resists the resurfacing urge to unroll his sleeves. He tries to smile at Garak, and hopes it’s not funny-looking. “But, I, um – I really would like to come out with you again.” _I would?_

 

_I would._

 

Garak returns the smile. “Happy to hear it. Any ideas?”

 

“Doesn’t that depend on what number it is?”

 

“It most certainly does. That’s why it’s up to you. You tell me what you’d like to do, and – within reason – we’ll do it.”

 

Julian laughs loudly and is about to make a joke about visiting some of the planets they looked at on their walk to the theater, but then the couple in front of him turns and makes quite a show of frowning. The elderly woman glares over the top rim of her rhinestone-encrusted glasses, and Julian feels his eyes widen as he sinks further into his chair. The woman's date looks Julian up and down and sniffs disapprovingly, glaring with one good eye through an actual _monocle._

 

Garak smiles politely at the pair, showing an awful lot more teeth than usual. 

 

“Don’t worry,” he says sweetly, patting Julian's arm, “I’ll keep him quiet during the show.” 

 

“See that you do,” the woman says, sniffing. The couple turns back, muttering to each other and shaking their heads. 

 

Garak aims his innocent smile back at Julian. “You were saying?”

 

“Nothing, not important.” Julian is careful to keep his voice low and gestures to the stage while the room continues to fill. “Can you tell me what this is about, since I haven’t got a readable program?”

 

“It is most certainly ‘ _readable,_ ’ just not by you.”

 

Julian leans toward Garak, bracing himself on the armrest between them. And, _shit_ , he’s grinning and joking and maybe he’s _flirting_ with this man he keeps saying he isn’t sure about. “You know, if I didn’t know you, I would think you were trying to insult me. Do you treat _all_ your dates this way?”

 

“Only the very best ones.” Garak leans in too, smushing them shoulder to shoulder. It's warm and a little tingly and definitely more exciting - more _fun -_ than it ought to be. It's surprising that it’s funny, pleasant, and like they’re sharing a joke. Any time Garak does something flirty, Julian expects things to take a sharp and immediate turn into discomfort, but it it's just not happening. He's been swinging back and forth between entirely forgetting that this should be a date and being hyper aware of it, but other than a slight loss of balance from the mental swaying, Julian is _comfortable_. 

 

“As for what it’s about...” Garak slides over the armrest enough to elbow Julian, “...you’ll recall that I've already told you.”

 

“Oh, come on. Surely the program says more than ‘ _This is about a death. Dead guy played by Mister Jones_.’”

 

“It certainly does.” Garak folds his program up and tucks it away. He looks at Julian with this smug fluttery eyelash expression that is both funny and mildly infuriating. “But I think you may enjoy it more if you don’t know what’s coming.”

 

_He definitely made sure I got a program I couldn't read._ “You are positively irritating sometimes.”

 

It's very possible that what Julian hears is a giggle. “I want to take this moment to point out that you’ve already agreed to go out with me again.”

 

“Then I’ll have to suggest we go somewhere just as _irritating_ as you are.” 

 

A creeping smug smile forms on Garak's face and _wow,_ it is almost embarrassing how much he seems to enjoy being called irritating. _Anger equals flirting? I think it's working both ways? Am I just imagining that? Is it just the joke he likes?_

 

Thankfully, the lights begin to fade around them, Garak does nothing but turn his smile to the stage (though his eyes linger a bit), and Julian settles into his chair to brace himself for 'a story about a death'. 

 

A story that wastes no time at all being about a death. In the center of the blackened stage a bright light suddenly illuminates both a sleek and polished black casket and a single figure wearing a mask and some very elaborately styled Cardassian hair. Her red dress is thick on her frame, and she seems nearly buried under layers.

 

“He was never good enough to me!” A angry woman's voice bursts from the mask, and when she cries out, the light projected upon her bursts into tiny flecks, and then spins out to the sides of the stage to form a translation of her outburst in six other languages. 

 

Julian feels foolish for gasping in surprise, but judging by the sound in the auditorium, he isn't the only one who couldn't read his program. He glances at Garak, who is still wearing a knowing smile. 

 

_One day, I am going to find something that surprises_ you. _And I will feel no shame in being the smuggest bastard alive._

 

The next outburst on stage is in a language Julian doesn't understand, and his linguistic skills aren't sharp enough to know what language it is. But, just like the last one, the spotlight breaks up and scatters to border the stage in translations. This one is, _“We didn't have enough time!”_

 

The woman continues in this vein of angry regret while assuming some very stiff poses of matching anguish. They're either traditional, or limitations imposed by the massive amount of fabric she's wearing. _Or both,_ Julian considers. When the woman finally collapses to the floor and falls silent, the stage goes black and another voice booms over the auditorium. 

 

“Now I hope you all see how valuable he was!” A man's voice this time, and just as angry as the woman's had been. When the spot light returns, his dark green costume has replaced the woman's red as the commanding color on the stage. He practically spits all the dead person's fantastic qualities over the stage, and the translated phrases splattering onto the walls help with the illusion. His mask's expression is twisted, permanently bitter.

 

Soon the woman's voice is heard again, and the man begins arguing with her while she's offstage.

 

_Or perhaps not._ It's an argument in that they are both yelling loudly in response to each other, but they don't seem to be bothering to counter each other's opinions.Julian shifts in his seat. The exploding translations are still beautiful, and the chaotic mess they make during the screaming match is a nice way to _show_ an argument, but Julian is convinced it needs to sound like one too. 

 

_I would have thought Cardassian arguing would be a bit more sophisticated than this. Garak's always singing the praises of complicated layers of meaning..._

 

Garak leans close and whispers, “Patience.” 

 

Julian's skin tingles in response to Garak's breath. Thankfully, it dissipates quickly. Julian offers Garak a guilty glance and tries to refocus on the show and masking his reactions.

 

The angry man runs off the stage, which is still empty but for the casket, and then a child's voice is heard. “He ruined me.” It's followed by another woman, this time sweet, gentle and apologetic. “He did his best.”

 

This woman, differentiated from the angry one by a smiling mask with long eyelashes, flutters over the stage in a long, flowing, lavender dress. While the child's voice repeats its accusations of ruin off stage, this woman glides back and forth, telling the child its reasoning is flawed and maintaining, “He did his best.” 

 

Julian has to collect some significant self-control not to frown at a mother making excuses to child for a father. It's likely Garak notices him clenching his fist.

 

The spotlight winks out, and the woman vanishes. When the spot light returns in the same place a second later, the child has taken her place. The child's mask features large, sad eyes and the only movement is a slow shaking of its head from side to side. It seems to be drowning in clothing.

 

Soon, in addition to the people he's already seen, Julian is charged with keeping track of a sobbing man (“There was so much more to do!”), a contented man (“We all knew it would happen. Be at peace.”), and a confused teenage boy (“Where is he? He should have come to get me.”). None of these people are ever on stage together, but they fight to overpower each other. The sweet woman stands in the center of the stage and all the other voices drown her out, driving her to the ground and crushing her under the weight of their disapproval with their translations glittering across the stage. At any given moment, six languages are being shouted, and not all of them are saying the same thing. The spectacle is like watching the explosions of color behind tightly closed eyes and suddenly Julian is really quite glad he doesn't have to keep track of a sophisticated argument.

 

As the voices conflict, they form a kind of chant with each other, their words weaving in and out, forming new phrases as they blend. Each person takes their turn being subdued by the others, each argues alone with each other one, and while it's all building, Julian realizes this is all one actor with several voiceovers. The final scene confirms it when the first persona, the angry woman, returns wearing significantly fewer layers, having peeled off costume after costume during the course of the production. She stands alone in the center of the stage and takes off her mask. There is no face underneath; the actor has been painted black to match the backdrop. She reaches down to the floor to place her mask in front of her and as she crumples into her costume, the masks of all the other characters are illuminated on the floor around her. Her only word in the final scene, and her last word, is “Me.”

 

After a moment or two of black, the lights in the auditorium come back up, and the hum of anxious people waves over the room. There's no curtain call, no ten minutes of applauding, no cheerful cast waving in exhaustion from the stage. Julian shifts a bit in his seat trying to mask the unexpected discomfort this brings. 

 

Garak turns to Julian wearing a pleasant expression, hands folded over one knee. “So? What did you think?”

 

“They were all the same person.” It comes out automatically and is profoundly dorky sounding. “I mean, yes, the actor was the same, but they were all parts of the dead person.” Garak's expression doesn't change and Julian raises his eyebrows, tilts his head, looks for confirmation. “Right?”

 

“Precisely.”

 

“Are they all people this dead person was at some point in their life, or the things they thought before they died?”

 

“Maybe they're all the lies they told themselves. Or maybe carefully guarded truths.”

 

“Hmm.” Julian tries to turn the show over in his mind. “You said this was a famous Cardassian story?”

 

“Yes, absolutely.” Garak works his shoulders into the chair behind him. He looks more like he's sitting on a beach with a cool breeze than in a theater. He's also clearly not going anywhere.

 

Julian turns to his useless program and flips through some of the advertisements in the back. “How is this told when it's not on stage?”

 

“Many ways. Radio, television, short story, poetry... Any way you can think of!”

 

Immediately, Julian is hit with concern that Garak might be ignoring obvious elements of this thing just because the work is Cardassian. _Is he being deliberately obtuse about this?_ “Wouldn’t you know as soon as the story started how it was going to end? How many ways are there to say that everyone has different sides?”

 

“As many as there are people. And it's certainly not as simple as just ' _everyone has different sides.'_ There are, of course, some cultural implications.”

 

Julian sighs, but he hopes Garak recognizes that it's a fond one.“Of course.”

 

“It is the most fun the first time you experience it, I suppose, but part of the allure is that it’s always different. It’s always the same at the core, but it’s the personas that arise and what they say about one person being many that is interesting. This particular dead person wished he'd gone back for his teenage dreams, and laments a perceived ruining of his childhood self. That this director chose to let this person have male and female facets is unusual, not to mention the presentation regarding the language. Every telling is new. The joy is seeing the same idea conveyed in many media and really meeting a new and complex person each time.”

 

“I'm still not sure how it would work. Or if I’d want to see this over and over... I don't really feel like I met this dead person at all. But you enjoyed it? Even though you already knew?”

 

“Yes, very much.” He closes his eyes and nods in Julian's direction. “I'm sorry you didn't.”

 

“Oh, no, no, it's not that. Just that I perhaps enjoy novelty too much to watch this same thing again.”

 

“I'll keep that in mind.”

 

It's not that Garak sounds _disappointed_ exactly– though it's possible he does and Julian just can't pick up on it yet – but there is something in his tone that makes Julian wish he'd said something else.

 

“I'm sorry. I really _did_ enjoy the way it was presented, and-”

 

“Not to worry, my dear.” Garak pats the back of Julian's hand. His fingers linger against Julian's skin for a few seconds. It's not unexpected. “Our discussions would be a bit bland if you and I felt the exact same way about the subject matter, wouldn't they?”

 

It's sincere and it's rather charming. Julian grins. 

 

“Excuse us.” Julian jumps at the sound of another voice. The interruption (“ _Interrupting_ what _exactly?”)_ is awoman on the other side of Garak. She smiles apologetically and motions to the aisle on the other side of Julian. 

 

“Oh, sorry!” Julian scrambles to his feet, dropping his program in the process, while Garak rises from his seat like smoke. He steps back against his seat and while he normally takes up more space than Julian, it almost feels that Garak has vanished. 

 

Almost. His hand has slid to Julian's elbow. 

 

The woman shuffles by, nodding, apologizing, watching her feet. When she gets to the aisle she smiles back at them, biting her lip. It's a brief moment, but Julian smiles back and they nod awkwardly at each other before she scoops up her dress and continues on.

 

Garak gently tugs at Julian's elbow. “Are you ready to go?”

 

Gentleness be damned, Julian feels as though the tugging has dislodged something in his chest anyway. “Oh, sure, sure. Whenever you are.”

 

“If you're up for it, the restaurant I'd hoped to take you to is nearby.”

 

Julian laughs and his arms flap once against his side. “Of course I'm 'up for it.' You really think I'm going to skip out early?”

 

There's something rather sly about Garak's smile. 

 

*****

 

Thanks to the show, the streets are full of people when Julian and Garak start the walk to the restaurant. He knew _logically_ it couldn't be true, but Julian is still happy to find out that the streets don't actually clear out in preparation for Garak to walk them.

 

He's on Garak's arm again. It still doesn't bother him, though there's a profoundly vivid Miles Voice in his head that is quite bothered, thanks. 

 

“So where are we going?”

 

“Pallra's. It's a popular to go after a performance here. And it's much more enjoyable with a companion.”

 

Julian raises an eyebrow. “Oh, _really?_ And what does that mean?”  


“Just that they serve primarily couples.”

 

“Ah, fantastic, it's been ages since I've eaten a decent couple.” 

 

Garak laughs into his scarf and shakes his head in mock-despair. “Perhaps you'll let me clarify.” 

 

“No, I think I rather like it my way.”

 

“Then I hope you aren't disappointed.”

 

Another block away sits the restaurant. There's a small bustling group of fellow theater refugees clustered outside, many with drinks and all happily chatting. The name _Pallra's_ glows in a tasteful golden script above their custom awnings. The windows obscure everything inside but the slight orange glow of some light fixtures and a few arches near the ceiling. 

 

“Oh, wow.” Julian's pause as they near the door is just enough to tug Garak back. 

 

“Everything all right?”

 

“Yes, fine, fine. This just looks really _nice_.”

 

“I think you'll find it is.” Garak releases Julian's arm and motions to the door. “Shall we?”

 

There's a small lobby inside, made smaller by another cluster of people and its low lighting. It's difficult to see to the far side of the room with all these people packed so tightly in, but Garak moves between people as though he's a shadow or a light breeze. He touches nothing but some fluff on the back of a dress. Julian elbows two people and is smacked in the shoulder by another in his attempt to follow Garak up to the little podium at the entrance to the dining area. 

 

Garak is leaned over the podium to make himself heard over the small crowd. “Yes, it's under 'Garak.'” 

 

The dark-haired young man behind the podium nods, makes a note on the chart in front of him and then holds a finger up. “Just a moment.”

 

Garak smiles and nods in return. “Thank you.”

 

Julian ducks under a heartily brandished wineglass, tucks himself against the wall by the podium and baps Garak's arm with the back of his hand. “Did you have to get _reservations_ for this?”

 

“I thought it wise. Unless you'd have preferred to wait with _these fine people_.” He raises his eyebrows and glances at the rest of the room. Julian can barely see the door from where he's standing. 

 

“They're _all_ waiting?” Julian's forearms feel so conspicuous they _itch._ He rubs his arms, probably looks like he's cold, and resists the temptation to roll down his sleeves.

 

“Most likely.”

 

Flocks of people waiting in a lobby with mood lighting, elegant archways, and even a few exotic potted plants. Waiting to be seated. Waited to be seated in a place with _reservations._

 

_Somewhere in here is a height chart saying 'must be this fancy to ride.'_

 

The host returns to his podium. “If you'll follow me.” He gathers two menus in his arms and leads the way into the dining room with his chin. Garak motions for Julian to go first and they follow to a row of booth seating attached to a decorative partition in the center of the room. 

 

Julian slides into his side of the booth and takes in the scenery. The décor in the dining area is even nicer than the stuff in the lobby. The light fixtures are long hanging vertical tube shapes that give off a gentle warm light, totally unlike the flickering, cold, blueish light that covers his favorite Klingon take away place. The seats are cushioned, match everything around them, and are certainly not torn or flat from overuse. There are paintings and long murals on the walls that appear to have been done with some real skill and not by a local highschool. 

 

He's staring at the lit candle in the center of the table when a menu and a bundle of silverware wrapped in _cloth_ land softly in front of him.

 

“Oh, thank you.”

 

The host nods politely at Julian. “Your server will be with you shortly. Is there anything I can get you now?”

 

Garak smiles at the man, and the mutual customer-service face on them is almost funny. “Nothing just now, thank you.”

 

They both turn to Julian. “Oh, no, no, nothing!”

 

The man bows and leaves them to the menus.

 

Garak opens his menu and takes a sip of the water in the fancy glass in front of him. Julian doesn't even remember seeing these set down. “You should be able to find something you like here.”

 

“I can find something I like pretty much anywhere.” He opens the menu, and when he sees a whole page of _appetizers_ , he realizes just how much this is not a coffee shop or take out. Some appetizers here cost more than whole meals of Klingon delivery. It's not so fancy that prices aren't listed, and it's probably only a little on the expensive side for people who work more than occasional shifts at a pizza shop, but for Julian, it's a bit overwhelming. 

 

“Garak, are you _sure_ this is okay?” _I could buy two slices of a pizza for the cost of this drink._

 

“Is there something wrong with it?”

 

“It’s just a lot to spend.” _I pay my electric company less than the cost of these vegetable wraps._

 

“It’s nothing, don't worry.”

 

“It just seems kind of _fancy_.”

 

“When compared to _Klingon delivery_ , absolutely. But take a look around.” He gestures to the tables off to Julian’s right, and while the light isn’t good enough for him to see details, he can see that there isn’t anyone wearing jeans and a t-shirt, but there’s also no one in a full tuxedo or draped completely in diamonds and sequins. Also apparent, low lighting or not, is that nearly every table is seating a couple. These are not fancy people, but these are nicely dressed people batting eyelashes over the rims of their wine glasses, smiling coyly at whispered jokes, and making big, obvious shows of laughing and using it as an excuse to touch.

 

“You see? Not _that_ fancy.”

 

“It’s still _nice_ here. You really don’t have to do this.” Julian takes a sip of his water. It's flavored with mint and lemon. Of course.

 

“Are you uncomfortable?”

 

“Not exactly. I just would never spend this much myself, so asking you to do it…”

 

“Well, you didn’t ask me, did you?”

 

“No, I suppose not.”

 

“And you agreed to--”

 

Julian laughs. “Romantic, right. I should have expected candles.”

 

“Then, please, order what you’d like.”

 

There’s an itch sitting in Julian’s brain while he looks at the menu and sees the prices. And something very distinctly not an itch sits around his neck. The scarf, dinner now, dinner the last time, tickets to both events…

 

He loosens the scarf a bit. “So…”

 

“Yes?”

 

“After all this – the scarf, and dinner, and the tickets and everything – you aren't... expecting anything, are you?”

 

Garak wrinkles his nose and frowns. “Absolutely not. What makes you think that?”

 

“Well, I just- You know you don't have to spend any money on me, and I know you're _interested_ , so...” He twirls the water in his glass, keeps his head low and looks up at Garak, rather than directly at him, hoping to convey _no offense._

 

Garak bows his head. “Please consider everything a 'thank you' for spending some of your time with me.”

 

Julian smiles. “I can do that. Sorry, I just thought it best to check now rather than when it was too late.” _Wait, no, that sounds terrible._

 

“Of course.”

 

He does look directly at Garak now, trying to sweep away 'too late' with some measure of sincerity. “And it’s not like it's an ordeal to do something with you, you know. I mean, you say it's a thanks for spending my time as though I need compensation, and I really don't. You’re my -” He stops, and lowers his voice, pulling the menu close to his chest. “Can I call you my friend if we’re on a date?”

“Please do. I can think of few better things to be than friends.”

“Well, there. Okay. You’re my friend, and so it’s not a chore to talk to you. It's fun.”

“Delighted to hear it.”

Julian smiles and Garak smiles but neither says a word. The menu offers a refuge from and excuse for awkward silence, so Julian buries himself in a small mountain of descriptions of sauces and cheeses and dressings and spices and flavors. Despite his reservations about this place being fancy, the menu offers some happy surprises. Not only does Julian recognize some of the dishes on this menu, but it actually contains some of his favorites. Tarkalean tea is on offer and he's surprised to see pasta dishes that aren't full of exotic or endangered meat. The selection here is widely multicultural and it's the first menu he's ever seen listing both Bajoran and Cardassian entrees in the same column. 

_I wonder how good or authentic any of this can be if they're trying to cook seven different styles of food at one time..._

Suddenly a woman at the table closest to them laughs so hard she snorts, and the sound is accompanied by two dozen clinks and scrapes as other surprised diners jump with glasses and forks in hand. Julian watches her clap her hand over her mouth and then try to shield her reddening face with her drink. Her date is trying not to giggle, but she's doing a terrible job and soon the table is a feedback loop of shamed wailing and restrained gigglesnorting. 

Julian turns to Garak. “Are you _sure_ we don't get to eat the other couples in here?”

Garak's mouth loosens into a smile and his raised eyebrow returns to its usual height. “I'll have a word with the chef.”

And just like that, the food has become a secondary element of dinner. 

“You think they're Bajoran?” Julian asks. “It might look a little weird if you chose to eat them specifically.”

“Or appropriate, if you ask them.”

“Perhaps there's some Bajoran in here eyeing you up as we speak.”

Garak sets his menu aside. “I rather hoped it'd be _you_ doing that.”

Julian shrugs. “I'm terrible at romantic staring. It's cannibalism or nothing, I'm afraid.”

“Who told you you were terrible?”

“My bathroom mirror.”

When their server arrives in the middle of a conversation about cannibalism in prehistoric society, Julian orders his tea, Garak declines another drink beyond his fancy water, and hurrying through the menu to find something to eat seems like a hassle rather than the reason they're here. 

Julian scans the menu, pinpointing the things Deep Dish Nine and The Kitchen Of Greatest Honor can't provide. “Is the steak any good?”

Garak pleasantly leafs through the pages of the menu. “I have no idea.”

“Um, okay, well, what have you tried?”

“Nothing. I've never been here before.”

“What, really?! I thought-”

“I've never had a date to bring with me.” He raises his eyebrows and tilts his head toward the rest of the dining room filled with couples and small groups celebrating. “Would _you_ want to eat here alone?”

“No, I suppose not.”

“I would suggest ordering something a bit more interesting than steak. Something you can't make at home.”

“It's funny that you think I can make steak.”

“I have faith in you.”

“I promise it's unfounded. I can make toast. That's about it.”

“Perhaps you'll let me teach you otherwise?”

Julian laughs in his menu. “You want to teach me to _cook_? In addition to teaching me to read Cardassian playbills? Will you teach me to sew after that?”

A gracious nod. “If you'd like, I'd be happy to.”

Images of Garak insisting on taking measurements put Julian firmly on the side of dealing with food and fire. “We'll stick to cooking.”

And suddenly here's the tea – placed on a perfect little coaster – and their server, her tag says 'Amara', in her perfect black and white uniform, stands ready at the end of the table. “Are you ready to order?” 

There are probably four pages of the menu Julian hasn't even seen. 

“I think so.”

Garak looks quite skeptical at Julian's reply, but he only answers Amara. “I think we are, yes. I'm going to try the redbat.”

Julian hadn't even seen _bat_ on the menu, and can't imagine eating one on purpose. He scans the menu frantically. Groatcake is breakfast, eggs probably are too. He can get Hasperat anywhere... 

_Oh._

Garak has just finished specifying every silly detail about his meal when Julian sees _exactly_ what he wants back in the appetizer pages. Amara turns to him and doesn't even have to ask before Julian grins and announces, “I'm going to try the Federation Platter.”

“Okay, great. Any allergies?”

“None that I know of.” 

“Great.”Amara scribbles in her little notebook and gathers the menus. “We'll have those out for you shortly!”

Julian nods some kind of thanks as Amara speeds off.

Garak is smirking across the table. “Really?”

“What? I couldn't decide on just one thing, so I'll try a little of all of it.”

“It's an awful lot of food.”

“I think I can handle it. And if there's any _bat_ on my plate, you can have it.”

“Yes, well, I think it unlikely that I'd ever be visiting the Andorians in person to try their food, so this seemed the logical solution.”

Julian removes his scarf in preparation to try his tea, and to avoid spilling bits of Andorian something or other on it later. There's no where to put it where he isn't likely to forget about it, so he loops it around his hands a few times and then stuffs it into his coat pocket. When he looks back up, he catches Garak staring.

“What?”

Garak shakes his head and the stare is gone, replaced by a sweet smile. “Nothing, nothing.”

The Tarkalean tea is unbelievably good, and so much better than the instant version he makes in his apartment. Just the right amount of spice, sweet, and aroma. It's so relaxing, it's easy to pretend he has a proper segue into a conversation. “So, the thing we saw. How did you first hear this... story?”

Garak lowers his eyebrows. “You sound hesitant to call it a story.”

“Well, to me, it feels more like a trope than a story.” 

  
“That sounds a bit diminishing.”

 

“It's not meant as an insult. I just expected characters and an arc and some sort of resolution when you said ' _story_ about a death.'” 

 

“It's all there, but only the final part was staged.”

 

Julian snatches a few packets of sugar from the other end of the table, more to fuss with them than put them in his tea. “So it's more like people only know the end of the story. Is this common? To just not bother with most of the narrative?”

 

Garak folds his hands together. “Why should we need to have it all explained any more than it was?”

 

“We don't even know the dead person's name!”

 

Garak smirks into his glass of water. “I've known plenty of people without a name.”

 

Julian sighs and nearly tears the sugar packet he's been folding in half. “But you still don't think it's a trope?”

 

“No. For this particular story, I think that's impossible. The whole of Romeo and Juliet isn't a trope, is it?”

 

“But there isn't _a – we didn't see a whole_ , just an end! And frankly, I think 'person has many facets' is absolutely a trope.”

 

“But the characters, the backstory... everything changes depending on who is telling and who is listening and in what medium. You can say that _everything_ is derived from this story as much as you can say _nothing_ is.” 

 

“Are you saying this whole multi-person idea isn't common? You told me this story was popular.” 

 

“It's well-known, but not frequently employed outside this framework. This is the only place this idea occurs in popular literature.” 

 

Julian puts his elbows on the table and leans into them, cradling his teacup near his lips. “There's no one who is even slightly dimensional at all in Cardassian literature? Bullshit.”

 

He raises his eyebrow when Julian swears, but the straw in Garak's water has his full attention. “I didn't mean that. I said ' _popular_.'”

 

“Do you mean 'state approved'?”

 

Garak smiles fondly at his glass of water. “Quite. Even then, people who have 'sides' or 'aspects' like this in literature – especially of the sort that is seen as contrary to their sex – are generally not to be trusted. They're _traitors._ ”

 

And then Garak's eyelids flick and he looks up at Julian and it's not sweet or pleasant or even romantic. He hardly moves, the glance his all in his eyes, and yet it's like the entire man is different. Julian isn't foolish enough to think that he knows Garak extremely well, but he likes to think he sees more than most. Quark certainly doesn't notice that Garak's smiles for him are full of venom. Miles wouldn't recognize sincerity on Garak any more than he'd know a radius from an ulna. Julian sees Garak wearing many faces for others because Julian himself does it so well. But this is a smile he hasn't seen before. 

 

This one is a dare. 

 

“And are you a traitor?”

 

“I'm a tailor.” Garak's smile widens and his eyes narrow. He is _very_ pleased with Julian's question, as much as he had been at being called 'irritating,' and possibly just as pleased that it's territory they can't cross in public. Julian can't go any further with this now, but this _has_ to be an invitation. For now, back to a story about a death.

 

“So, do you have some small woman in you somewhere who is screaming about hems, then?”

 

“What makes you think that part of me would need to be a woman?”

 

He now knows exactly how the laughing woman from earlier felt and he tries to hide himself behind his tea.“Ugh, sorry, I just – you're going to keep hitting me with the gender bat until I get it, aren't you?”

 

“You struck first, my dear. I claim self-defense.”

 

“Fair, fair, totally fair. With your cooperation then, we'll go beyond my faulty understanding, and go back to the beginning. How did you first hear this?”

 

“It was a story told to me as a child.”

 

“But _how_ was it told? Did it have defined characters, or did they tell you a scene for scene version of what we just saw?”

 

“The first time I heard it, it was something of a warning.”

 

“Oh?” _Warning stories from Garak's childhood?_ Julian tilts his head and settles his tea on his bottom lip. 

 

Garak is looking in Julian's direction when he talks, but Julian can't say Garak _sees_ him. 

 

“I was out walking with a family friend. He was quizzing me on things I'd learned in my studies. I'm sure you'll appreciate it when I say I was a bright child, and was not well understood by others.” 

 

Julian nods, takes a sip of his tea. The candlelight is the brightest thing near them and it shimmers and slides on the rim of Garak's glass. It's strange and suitably hazy and dramatic lighting for a story of young Garak.

 

“I asked a lot of questions. Not just that day, but always. And as we walked, we discussed everything and anything I asked about. And you know questions have something of an insatiable need to create more of themselves. There's always another 'why.' As we talked, it became clear to my friend that my curiosity combined with those things at which I excelled could get me into trouble in a society like Cardassia's.”

 

Julian lets his tea cup cover his face from the nostrils down. _A society you still seem to long for._

 

“I was meant to follow after my uncle in his business, and while I was quite good at what that would entail, I also possessed a certain curiosity and more than a few other skills that were not supposed to be part of my future. That was when he told me the story.”

  
  


Garak is looking at him, but Julian isn't entirely sure he's being seen.   
  
  


“He asked if I knew that I was more than one person. I told him I did not. He told me that just as I was someone's son, nephew, student, or friend, I could also be several people inside. I remember telling him that that was children's talk, but he insisted that here I was: a scientist, a gardener, a problem solver, someone kind, someone rational, someone sensitive, someone vengeful, someone creative and so on and so on. The sorts of things you tell children, I suppose, but they may have had some inkling of truth. 

“My job was to keep them all alive, but hidden. I could die without all these things, but just as easily die for letting them 'loose.' Business, he said, would not favor a kind or sensitive gardener, but it would look well upon a rational problem solver, and I was to pretend to be only that from skin to spine.”   
  
  


“I notice 'tailor' isn't on the list.” Julian sets his tea down, and leaves his elbows on the table.  
  
  


Garak puts up a finger. “Ah, but it is _amazing_ how often I have opportunities for vengeful problem solving as a tailor.”  
  
Julian snickers at the thought of some plaid and tangerine-colored bridesmaids with dresses full of itching powder or just one stealth sequin sewn in for maximum irritation. “I suppose so! I notice you're not in your uncle's business anymore, though.”  
  
  


“Are you sure about that?”  
  
  


“I'm certain he wasn't a tailor, or you would have said so rather than steering around naming his profession.”  
  
  


Garak's eyes widen. It's subtle in the low light, and quick, but Julian knows face-lies very well.   
  
  


“So you _are_ paying attention. Maybe you're eyeing me up after all?”

  
  


Julian smirks. “Maybe.”

  
  


“I'll be sure to be more clever in the future.” Garak's smile is one of his nicer ones, though there are glinting hints of the dare left. 

  
  


_There's a really good chance you just left all that open for me. I'm not as clever as you are evasive._

  
  


Amara returns then with Garak's small salad. “Here you are. Your meals will be out in just a little while. Do you need anything else with this?”

  
Garak is all smiles. “No, miss, thank you.”   
  
She's gone as quickly as she came and Julian watches Garak prepare to eat fancily. He puts the cloth napkin from the silverwear in his lap (prompting Julian to slooowly and surreptitiously do the same) and picks a _specific_ fork from the many available in the bundle.

  
  


Garak motions to Julian with his fork.“Would you like me to wait until you have something?”

  
  


Julian waves his hand. “Oh, no, go on. I'm fine. So, did you do what your friend asked you to?”

  
After he swallows a forkful of salad, Garak answers, “I made the attempt. Whether I've succeeded remains to be seen. He finished his story by telling me that the other parts of me, the hidden parts, would become obvious upon my death. That the people I shared those parts with would expose them when they couldn't hurt me.”   
  
Julian takes care not to flinch. _What an intense thing to tell a child._ “Is that what we saw then? A moral, rather than a story or a trope?”  
  
“I might be willing to call it that.” Garak is _cutting_ his salad and Julian has just now learned that that is something that is done.  
  
“Then, what I'm wondering is: What's the story that goes with the moral? If everyone supplies their own background and--” Julian wraps his fingers around the tea cup again, though he doesn't bother taking a drink. _Oh, wait._ “You know, there was something you said to me before the show started, about Cardassians being Cardassia?”

 

“Yes.” Garak smiles. It’s a mixture of mischief and pride.

 

“Is that something a lot of you say? Like a common cultural saying?” Julian flails his left hand a bit, right hand still firmly attached to his tea.

 

“Nearly as common as that story, I would think.” Garak slowly pulls his water away from Julian, warily keeping an eye on the teacup.

 

“What if they are the same thing? All those people making up one whole?”

 

“It’s a nice idea, but I can’t imagine anyone writing a story in which Cardassia is implied to be _dead_.”

 

“But maybe they did! Maybe this entire story is subversive.”

 

“They seem to have failed, if that’s the case. It’s hardly subversive if everyone agrees it’s celebratory of the very thing you’re trying to subvert. People are proud enough of this story to risk showing it in a Bajoran neighborhood, after all.” He takes another bite of the salad. Julian can smell some kind of vinegar in the dressing. 

 

“Is it celebratory, though? No one applauded the dead person for keeping himself well-guarded, not even the audience. It seemed more like a statement of fact to me.”

 

“The whole show as a statement of fact?”

 

“Well, yes. It all boils down to, ‘Each of us are many people,’ or even just, ‘Everyone is complex.’”

 

“You're talking about tropes again, my dear. Does Romeo and Juliet boil down to, ‘Teenagers are phenomenally, dramatically stupid?”

 

Cup abandoned as a distraction for his hands, Julian tears the corner from a sugar packet and begins slowly filling his spoon with sugar. “No? Though, now that I’m thinking about it, isn’t it weird that most people regard that story as a classic romance? They both _die._ ”

 

“That, and the story lasts for a whole _three days_.”

 

Julian shakes his head, and the sugar has formed a little hill on his spoon. “That’s utterly mad. It would take me a fair lot longer than three days to decide I loved someone that much.”

 

Garak mimes checking a watch. “How long _would_ it take?”

 

“Very funny.” Julian sends Garak a fond sort of glare and slowly dumps the sugar hill into his tea cup. “But, to the point of depraved suicide? Never. I’d absolutely never do that.”

 

“Good to hear. How about not to that point?”

 

Maybe this is fishing on Garak's part, maybe it's wishful thinking, maybe it's just regular thinking. It's also perhaps regular madness to answer, but Julian does it anyway. “Definitely more than a long weekend. It’d be _months._ Years, maybe, I don’t know. It might depend on the person.”

 

“And have you done it before?”

 

The spoon nearly falls into the cup. “Fallen in love with someone?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“I don’t know. I think so. I had someone I thought was going to be really perfect once. And then things didn’t work, and, errrrm, I guess we weren’t in love anymore. So I’m not sure we ever were.”

 

Garak pulls the napkin up to his mouth. “Are you old enough to be that cynical?”

 

“You aren’t old enough to know what I’m talking about?”

 

Garak laughs, sets down his fork, and sets the napkin on the table in front of him. “You’re charming, Julian.”

 

“I try.”

 

“ _Do_ you?”

 

“You don't have to sound so skeptical. Doesn't everyone?”

 

“I'm sure some of us do. _Your_ charm, however, seems effortless. Have you deceived me?”

 

Julian tries to laugh, but it comes out more like a snort. “I'm afraid the only thing I do effortlessly is consistently mess up normal things.”

 

“Do you?”

 

“I sometimes think that everyone else got a class in how to leave voicemails and accept gifts and I just missed it.”

 

“I suppose you missed the class about properly clothing yourself for half the year as well?”

 

Julian frowns as he folds another sugar packet. “I _do_ notice that you're answering everything with questions, you know.” 

 

“ _Do you?_ ” And now he's _laughing._

 

Garak dodges the organic cane sugar packet almost before Julian is aware he's thrown it. 

 

“ _Yes,_ I _do_ , dammit.” 

 

Garak flicks the little packet back. “My dear, it's possible this is not the best place for that sort of language.” 

 

“You're _lucky_ I _like_ you.” Julian flings the sugar back with as much force as he thinks fancy can tolerate.

 

“Oh, _believe me_ , I know.” Garak knows fancy's limits better than Julian. He places the sugar packet on the table and slides it toward the wall to sit with the salt and pepper. “Now tell me more about the play being subversive.”

 

“Well, it _was_ just a theory.”

 

“Don't let me dismiss your ideas.”

 

“I'm not, but I don't have all the necessary context to make any kind of extended analysis of this story as it fits into _your_ culture, and you're probably too far _in_ the context to be able to see beyond it. I've probably done too much already.”

 

Garak blinks. “Context? Really?”

 

“Like you pointed out on the phone, you're the only Cardassian I actually _know_ to any degree. Everything else I think I know comes from Dukat, and Nerys complaining about him.”

 

“There are people who would consider that sufficient information to make a judgment.” He's staring at the candle. The light flickers and blinks and while it highlights some of Garak's features – his chin and his nose, in particular – it makes it very difficult to read his eyes.

 

“I'm not those people,” Julian says firmly.

 

When Garak's gaze lifts from the flame, his eyes are pleased well beyond what the low light can hide. “I'm happy to hear that.”

 

Suddenly, a massive plate floats down to the table in front of him. Amara has returned with both dishes. Julian's plate is shaped like a giant golden leaf and the food comes in so many shapes and colors that it looks both like a party and a petri dish. 

 

Even when Amara places Garak's meal on the table, all attention is on Julian's giant leaf. 

 

“Anything else for you two?”

 

Garak's eyes are locked on Julian's plate. “I think we're going to need a few more napkins.” 

 

She produces them from her apron and bows out with a friendly, “There you go! Enjoy!”

 

“Where will you start?”

 

“Vulcan, I think.”

 

“Good luck.”

 

Julian grabs a fork and tries to keep his elbows out of Betazed and Rigel IV. “So this dying business.”

 

Garak cuts daintily into his bat. “Right, go on.”

 

“This is all without context, as I said, but it just seems amazing to me that this moral, or trope, or story, or whatever this is, would not be everywhere. If you were told this as a child, it's likely everyone was. And if it's so popular that it's conveyed through every media... You're all sort of marinating in it, from what I can tell. You're all being told your entire lives to present a perfect outside, so I can imagine this being such a big thing, such a romantic notion.”

 

“Romantic? A story about a death?”

 

“You were the one who took me to see it _as a date_.” The mashed something or other from Vulcan has a consistency reminiscent of creamed corn. Logic would suggest that it's vegetarian, so at the very least, it and the creamed corn are cousins.

 

“Ah. I'm afraid you've got me there.”

 

Julian grins smugly and Garak returns with a smile so pleasantly pleased that Julian nearly forgets what he's saying. 

 

“Well.” He coughs, takes a sip of tea, and soldiers on with the vegetable pudding goop. It's a bit sticky and difficult to get down without a drink. “Well, anyway, wouldn't you, after being taught this, hope that people were really different inside? Say you fall in love with someone who doesn't love you. Wouldn't there be loads of stories in which the person you love really does love you, it's just the facet they're supposed to repress?”

 

“You tell me.” Garak brushes the back of Julian's hands with his knuckles. It's quick, and it's difficult to tell if it's a fancy restaurant version of a playful shove or a proper romantic date caress and it makes all the hair on Julian's exposed arms stand straight up.

 

Julian laughs it off, but even he hears the awkward nerves in the sound. “God, sorry. I didn't mean to do anything weird. Or imply anything, I mean. It doesn't even apply to me, I'm not Cardassian, so I'm not doing all of that, you know?” _Impressive babbling._

 

“Aren't you?”

 

“Don't start that again. I'm out of sugar, but I can still throw a fork at you.”

 

“I don't think you'd dare.”

 

Julian stabs at the air just above Garak's hand. “Come on. I would have thought you'd like to talk about this.”

 

“Oh, I do.” He swats Julian away from his plate. “I most definitely do. As for the scenario you brought up, it is possible something like that exists, but I would think it would be hidden somewhat.”

 

“Hidden?”

 

“In literature the state did not deem worthy of much investigation.”

 

Julian frowns and abruptly lodges his spoon in the lumpy pudding. “Are you telling me that _you_ , Mister Challenge Julian's Worldview, only read _state-approved books?_ You were just telling me that you were curious and asked the wrong questions.”

 

“You seem to be under the impression that I'd spent a lot of time reading _romances_.”

 

“You think that would really be the only place this idea would be present? I can't believe that.”

 

“I think you're forgetting that this story is as much about the _death_ as it is about the facets of a person.” 

 

“Is it like this in your day to day lives as well, then? Do you all just sit around and pretend to have one side all the time? How does anyone have any meaningful connections at all?”

 

Garak shrugs. “I find everyone has a public face and a private one, Cardassian or no, but it's an ideal, and it's a concept. You don't live by the morals of every fairy tale or fable you've ever heard, do you?” 

 

“No, but I always imagined Cardassians to be complex, or complicated, or...at least like to be thought of that way? Is this my lack of context talking?” 

 

“I think you're confusing 'all Cardassians' with 'just Garak' again.” He pops a small piece of food into his mouth and swallows it before Julian even manages a reply. “But I have to say I'm rather flattered.”

 

“Oh, really?” It comes out in a squeak, and Julian is quick to cough and choke down some tea in order to mask it. “I'd have -” another cough, “thought you'd be eager to say you were nothing but a tailor again.”

 

“It is important, though,” Garak says sweetly, “for a few select people to know of one's other facets. How else would a man's sides be revealed after his own death?”

 

_Is he... telling me that he's elected to show me sides that no one else sees? Or that he … sees what I do? Or both?_

 

Vulcan food is leaving much to be desired, so with half the sticky pudding left, Julian moves on to some kind of puff ball. He's seen Jadzia eat these before in the break room. She'd told him once that they were the stewed souls of her past lives, but she jokes so often about the people she supposedly used to be that Julian expects to hear that a little of Tobin exists in cans of Slug-O Cola from the vending machine.

 

“So do people typically show up and say horrible things about dead people during Cardassian funerals?”

 

Garak winces. “Are you really going to talk about funerals while eating Trill food?”

 

Julian pulls the little puff away from his teeth. “...Whyyy should it matter that it's Trill, specifically?”

 

Garak returns to cutting delicately into his meal, eyebrows raised. “You should ask Miss Dax about it.”

 

“...Will do.” The puff ball seems slightly ominous now, perhaps even threateningly filled with Tobin, but Julian pops it in his mouth. It turns out to be primarily sweet breading over some sort of vegetable paste. This is much better than Vulcan food. He's bitten the other puff in half to get a look inside it before he's even finished chewing the first one. The vegetables inside are multiple shades of red and purple and have been cooked in some kind of thick dressing. 

 

He'd be totally willing to eat stewed souls on a regular basis if this is how they tasted. “Wow, these are really excellent. Do you want to try this?” He nudges the third Trill Puff toward Garak. 

 

Garak eyes the puff as though it may strike him. “Oh. Well...” 

 

Julian dials his enthusiasm down a few notches. “Sorry. It's too fancy in here to allow sharing, isn't it? I should have warned you I'd be terrible in a place like this.”

 

“That's not true at all and you shouldn't think so.” He brightens considerably in his attitude toward the Trill Puff and gestures at it with his fork. “I think just a piece of it, if you're offering.” 

 

Julian fights with cutting the thing without smashing it or squishing all the insides out, and though he doesn't quite succeed, it's still edible. He carries the least disastrous portion onto Garak's plate with his fork and knife. Garak, of course, is beyond polite about the entire thing.

 

“Thank you. Would you like to try any of this?” Garak gestures to his plate, all smiles.

 

“What was it, rat or something?” Julian leans over his plate to get a better look at Garak's food, despite the miniature buffet in front of him. 

 

“ _Bat._ ”

 

“Right. Right.” He sits back, unsure of which sounds worse. “I'll think about it. I still have a few more things to try over here.”

 

A few is a slight understatement. Though it's hard to tell where one dish ends and the other begins in some places, there are at least ten places to sample here. The Bolian noodles on sticks are oddly spicy. Betazed's fish has not only been sliced to form a flower, but dyed as well. (“Likely vegetable dye in a place like this,” Garak says, “but authentic dye would have been made with the blood or eggs of the fish.” “...How do you even know that?”) Rigel IV's sample is some kind of meat that is really enjoyable until three bites in and then suddenly it is bitter and difficult to swallow to the point that Vulcan's vegetable glue sounds great again. It's great fun, though, and even with the huge amount of food present, Julian is sad there's not more to try.

 

The loaf of something or other from Andor is amazing, and is even better with a bit of Garak's redbat on top. (“I'll trade you another piece of my bat for a bit of that bread.” Julian trails crumbs over the table, and his cheek is full of food, but he eagerly makes the trade.)

 

Until Amara checks on them again, Julian has forgotten he's in a restaurant. 

 

He asks for a box. Even he can't finish everything on this massive plate, and no matter how little he liked Vulcan glue, it will all be a welcome change in the microwave from pizza and canned soup.

 

It's amazing how much there is to say about food. How everything is pitted against Cardassian fare for Garak, and how Garak's base for comparison is just another variation from somewhere else for Julian. What do the dishes selected say about the places they come from, if anything? (“Oh, and are Vulcan's sticky, do you think?” “As I recall, no. Though I'm not sure I ever got close enough to one to know for sure.”) Drifting into spicy ice cream and then to desserts and then to the food served at Quark's and how it might be in violation of basic health and safety code. 

 

Easy to drift from there to Odo, which leads to Manager Kira and Julian' job, where they don't serve enough dessert. (“Mister Sisko doesn't think it's worth the effort just yet.” “Just as well,” Garak sighs, “the little chocolate shop in the plaza is more than enough.” “There's a chocolate shop?” “Oh, I don't know how you ignore it.”) 

 

Amara places a bill on the table in a neat little plush case while Garak unloads a lifetime's worth of knowledge about chocolate. Suspiciously educated sweet tooth is probably one of the facets Garak was meant to keep concealed.

 

A sudden thought strikes Julian as Garak – a man who can vanish into his surroundings and unnerve with a single glance – talks earnestly of the virtues of dark chocolate.

 

“That story we saw,” Julan says suddenly.

 

Garak stops and tilts his head, inviting Julian to continue. 

 

“I just thought that the first time you hear the story, like you said, it's a warning. But every other time you see it, it's a dare to go against it. It reminds you each and every time that people are hiding. It... sort of calls itself out.”

 

Garak smiles. It's not at all like the man who was excited about chocolate a moment ago, but it very well could be a fraction of him. “Perhaps now you understand why I enjoy it.”

 

****

 

It's easy to imagine he's finished with the romantic hurdles until he and Garak are standing in the lobby of the apartment building. 

 

“It looks like I go this way.” Julian motions toward the stairs and immediately tries to pretend it's some other spontaneous hand motion. It's the most obvious thing in the world to say. Some distinct effort is involved to keep from rolling his eyes at himself.

 

“Come now, I said 'walk you home' and I meant it.” 

 

“It's just some stairs, you don't have t-”

 

“I'd very much like to. But if you'd rather we not get as _intimate_ as me seeing your _front door_ , I'll go.”

 

Julian laughs to keep from sighing and gestures up the stairs. “All right. Come on up.”

 

And now he's hyper-conscious of every footfall. Garak climbing these stairs is odd, but it's difficult to place why. It might be that it makes him more real. Julian is used to seeing Garak melt into the scenery, shimmer into the basement, and slip out of Deep Dish Nine without sounding the bell when it suits him: that he makes a sound when climbing flights of stairs is somehow surreal. 

 

They stop in front of Julian's door, and Garak takes quick charge of the situation. A relief and slightly terrifying. Just like the first time (or the second time, if they're going non-linearly), Garak motions to Julian's right hand. 

 

“May I?”

 

Though this time, Julian has the benefit of knowing what he's agreeing to when he nods and mumbles, “Yeah, sure.”

 

Julian stares at his hand against Garak’s throat for a moment. There's no sword, or fork, or anything. Just his own fingers. He could get lost in thought if he isn't careful. “Am I supposed to be doing something?”

 

Garak gently returns Julian’s hand. “Doing something?”

 

“Am I just supposed to stand there while you do something with my hand? What normally happens?”

 

Garak's laugh is not terribly sincere.“In your situation, standing there is probably fine.”

 

Julian blinks. “What is ‘my situation,’ exactly?”

 

“If our feelings were mutual, you’d take my hand the same way.”

 

Time to learn, perhaps. If he's going to end every date this way, and Julian's already agreed to another one, he's going to need a crash course in _everything._ “You said it was just some kind of fondness, didn’t you?”

 

“Right.”

 

“I could do this too, then. I mean, I like you, so why wouldn’t I?”

 

“Do you really think I like you the same way you like me?”

 

Julian shrugs. “Maybe I’m getting there, I don’t know. What are my other options?” He's not even sure he knows what he's saying.

 

Garak clasps his hands in front of him.“Polite acknowledgment, generally.”

 

“So, what, a ‘thank you’?”

 

“No, no, more of a… slight incline.” To demonstrate, he lowers his head without breaking eye contact. “A very shallow bow, perhaps.”

 

“Oh! You do those all the time!”

 

“Do I?”

 

“Yes, definitely! It sticks out a bit. You are the only person who has ever bowed at me for any reason. I can do that.” Mid-attempt at a bow, something strikes him. “Although…”

 

“Although what?”

 

“Could I be properly fond of you by a fourth date?”

 

“That’s entirely up to you.”

 

“Well, I actually meant – Nevermind. Can I hug you instead of all this? I think I understand those.”

 

“If you'd like.” There's relief in Garak's voice as much as is in Julian.

 

It would be easier if this were like hugging Miles. A simple clap on the back, a 'good show, see you around,' and a wave as they went their separate ways. But this is Garak, so it's got to be more complicated, it's got to be more significant. 

 

The stop and start beginning is far more awkward than the actual hug. Julian has a bag full of little boxes of leftovers and can't decide if it's weirder to put food on the floor, or risk hitting Garak in the back with it. 

 

Garak doesn't wait for Julian to decide, so hitting Garak in the ribs with styrofoam it is. 

 

As hugs go, it's quite nice. It's certainly warm, and with all the coats and scarves between them, it's even sort of pillowy. There's no careful distance here like there would be with Miles – Garak's arms have a much stronger hold on him than Miles has ever attempted and he and Garak have made more physical contact in this just this one hug than Julian thinks he's made with Miles in all the time he's known him. But even for the oomph of the thing, this is sincerely a happy embrace. It's really rather cute. He could even call it charming. 

 

Julian nearly laughs when he steps back. “Well, thank you for humoring me.”

 

“I could say the same!”

 

“I'll do some research, okay? Figure a bit more out on my own.”

 

“It's no trouble for me to teach you.”

 

Julian shifts his weight. “I think I do a bit better investigating myself, but if I come across something I just don't understand then...”

 

Garak nods and spreads his hands in a inviting gesture. “You are always welcome.”

 

“Well, great. Great, thanks.” 

 

That would have been the place to transition to some sort of parting, but now he's waited too long to say it. Garak, however, takes pity on him.

 

“I assume you have some work to do, so I'll let you go. Let me know when you think of something for next time?”

 

Julian jumps a bit. “Oh, oh, right. Yes, of course.” He reaches to his neck -– a habit of rubbing it when nervous or anxious or any number of -ous's –- and runs into the scarf. “Well, uh, thank you. For this. I mean, for all of it, not just the- the this, the scarf.” 

 

Once again, Garak takes barely concealed amusement in Julian's failure to communicate elegantly. “You're more than welcome. Thank you once again for the pleasure of your company. I sure you must have sacrificed some studying for my sake.”

 

“Oh, I think it was worth it.”

 

Garak takes a step back, and, as usual, parts with just the slightest bow. “Good night, Julian.”

 

“Good night, Garak.”

 

The door knob is awfully cold. 

 

 

****

 

 

Garak's apartment, normally his refuge into welcome solitude, feels empty. No matter what thing he finds to occupy his mind, the room is no longer full of things that entertain Elim Garak. Instead, it is bursting at the seams with things he aches to share with Julian Bashir. 

 

This film is so good, but why watch it alone tonight when perhaps it could be watched with Julian later? Wouldn't it be wonderful to read this poem to Julian if he really wants to learn the language? This snack would be perfect to share with him, this website would make him laugh, this painting is something he's really appreciate, this _song_ is –

 

_This is_ _madness_ _._

 

 

****

 

 

 

“I can’t believe you did this again.”

 

“Why not? It’s not like I haven’t told you repeatedly that I like talking to him. What did you expect?”

 

Miles just sighs and takes a drink. “You said he got you a scarf?”

 

Julian’s face feels a bit warm. “Yes. I made a giant mess of accepting it, but yes.”

 

“Well, let’s see it then.”

 

Julian hesitates until Miles frowns at him, and then retrieves the scarf from its space on the bookshelf. He hands it to Miles almost as though he’s ashamed of it, but he can’t really place why he feels that way.

 

The second it touches his hand, Miles’ eyebrows shoot up. “Whoa, this is what he gave you?”

 

“Yes. He said it would look nice with ‘my coloring.’”

 

Miles sniffs and turns the scarf over in his hand. “That makes you sound like a cat.”

 

“That’s sort of what I thought, too. It does look nice, though. Plus, it’s extremely soft.”

 

Miles shakes his head. “And you said he hasn’t made any kind of creepy move on you?”

 

“No? Why?”

 

“Julian, this is cashmere.”

 

“It’s what now?”

 

“Cashmere!” He shakes the scarf at Julian like he's trying to threaten him with it. “Keiko has some of this stuff. I had to get her a little shawl thing made out of this last year before New Year’s and I thought my wallet was going to throw itself off a bridge in despair. Julian, this stuff is _not cheap._ ”

 

“Oh.” Julian suddenly feels guilty even owning it, not to mention how he’d shoved it in his coat pocket at dinner and had it draped over a dusty bookshelf when he got home. It wasn’t that he hadn’t liked the gift, it was just that he’d had no idea it was anything more than the ‘small gift’ Garak had called it. He'd have treated something he bought himself no differently.

 

Miles just shakes his head, feeling the scarf in one hand and sipping his drink in the other. “He must be really hoping you’ll sleep with him.”

 

“Miles, that’s appalling. He didn’t give me this to try to buy his way into my pants! He _likes me!”_

 

“And how many girls that you _just liked_ did you buy cashmere scarves for?”

 

“None, but I apparently wouldn’t be able to afford it even if I’d wanted to.”

 

“I’m telling you, he’s trying to buy your favor. And you accepting it is giving him ideas.”

 

Julian snatches the scarf away. “Give me that! You’re making me sound like sort of freak escort service when all I’ve done is accept something he wanted to give me!”

 

“Hey, hey, now wait. That’s not what I’m saying. Just that I think if he wasn’t _really_ interested in dragging you to bed, he would have bought you something more reasonable. Like cotton. Or a giftcard or something.”

 

“You can't bring your date a _giftcard._ How the hell did you get married?”

**Works inspired by this one:**

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